() – A Florida sheriff is tired of the false threats of school shootings that abound in his county — so tired that he has a series of strong words and actions ready for students and parents alike: If you make a threat, “we’re coming after you.”
“You don’t get on a plane and yell, ‘Hijack.’ You don’t walk into a movie theater and yell, ‘Fire.’ And you don’t go online and post that you’re going to shoot up a school,” said Volusia County Sheriff Michael Chitwood. in a video on social media. “That will land you in jail.”
Chitwood’s comments come after the Arrest of an 11-year-old high school student in Port Orange, Florida, on Monday, who is being charged with a felony after making a false threat to commit a mass shooting at a high school, authorities said. is not naming the 11-year-old boy, who has been charged as a juvenile.
Beyond his shocking words, Chitwood is drawing attention for his approach of posting the names, mugshots and “offender walk videos” of students and their parents on social media for all to see.
The Volusia County Sheriff arrested an 11-year-old student for threatening a mass shooting at a high school. Deputies seized fake airsoft guns, fake ammunition, as well as knives, swords and other weapons.
“Sometimes you have to fight fire with fire,” he told on Wednesday. “Under Florida law, I have every right to release your son’s photo, the video of his arrest and the police report, and I can go after you, either criminally or civilly, for the cost of the investigation for endangering the child or endangering the welfare of a child.”
“And then we’re going to show pictures of you, the parents,” he said. “Because if you don’t want to raise your child, Sheriff Chitwood will raise him.”
Some parents of teenagers who killed people in school shootings are being held accountable. This includes the Georgia father who faces manslaughter charges. in the Apalachee High School shooting and the parents of the teenager who killed four students in the 2021 Oxford, Michigan shooting, who were sentenced to prison after being convicted of involuntary manslaughter – charges that in both cases push the legal boundaries of parental liability for a minor’s alleged weapons crime.
On Wednesday night, Chitwood posted two more videos online showing two handcuffed teenagers being led away to jail for making threats against the school.
“This was RIGHT AFTER your school played our message about how seriously we take these ‘jokes,’” she wrote on X. “Just unbelievable.”
School shooting threats have increased nationwide and in frequency in the days following the deadly shooting at a high school in Winder, Georgia, the deadliest school shooting in the United States since the March 2023 tragedy at Covenant School in Nashville, and the 49th this year.
For the 2022-2023 school year in Volusia County, Chitwood said the department had seen 357 written threats to kill or shoot at a school. As of Wednesday, they already had 282, and school has only been in session for three weeks this school year. In a 12-hour period from Thursday night to Friday morning, the department received 54 threats — all of them “false,” according to Chitwood. The department has arrested 12 juveniles and seized 11 guns so far, he said.
Some authorities are not just investigating threats of school shootings, but are holding students accountable. This week, charges have been filed against students in Kentucky, California, New MexicoNew Jersey, Missouri and South Carolina, in addition to the 11-year-old from Florida.
“What students do online can make them victims of crime or worse, and on the other hand, it can end up with a police officer knocking on your door to arrest your child,” she said, urging parents to be aware of what their children say online.
“(The 11-year-old) had written a list of names and targets,” Chitwood said in a social media post announcing the arrest. “He says it was all a joke.”
But after last Friday’s incident, Chitwood told , he’s tired of the jokes.
“Go talk to the families who have lost a loved one in a school shooting,” Chitwood said during a press conference last Friday. “These morons think it’s funny, go talk to those parents and see how funny this is. It’s not. We’re going to come after you and we’re going to put you in public shame.”
Chitwood has failed to follow through on his promise to show students arrested for these threats in at least one case: On Sunday, the sheriff announced that his office had arrested another teen for making a “false threat,” but said he decided not to film the “perp walk” because the student has autism.
The student was playing Fortnite when he allegedly threatened to “get some explosives and blow up” a Deltona high school, Chitwood wrote. in a post on X.
“Here’s the thing. He has autism,” Chitwood said. “I’m not going to do a perp walk of this kid on video this time. He’s in custody on a felony charge, and he’s going to face the consequences of his actions.”
“My promise to publicly expose others who make these threats still stands,” the sheriff said.
In some ways, what Chitwood is doing is like bullying, Yalda T. Uhls, founder and executive director of the Center for Scholars & Storytellers and adjunct professor of psychology at the University of California, Los Angeles, told .
“Publicly shaming someone in a way that is permanent and shareable … has very long-lasting effects on mental health, probably more extreme than traditional in-person bullying … it’s going to affect their lives,” said Uhls, who studies how media affects the social learning and behavior of preteens and teens.
But for some young people, public shame and embarrassment may be enough to motivate them to change their behavior, Uhls said, if combined with additional support through empathy-building or a change in school culture.
Without that secondary focus, Uhls said, it could backfire.
And because of the sense of permanence the Internet brings, these are the kinds of things that future employers or universities will have access to, Uhls said.
“Fifteen years ago, people were worried about drinking or traditional teenage behaviour, but now it’s about violence, sexism or racism, and these kinds of things end up doing a lot of harm to children and communities,” she said.
What is happening in Florida is not an isolated case, as people are being reported and arrested for school threats in several states.
Several students in Northern California were arrested this week for making online shooting threats, affiliate KCRA reported.
“You’re going to jail, you’re going to be handcuffed and you’re going to be taken away in front of all your friends and classmates,” Amar Gandhi, a spokesman for the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office, told the station. “We’re not concerned about your feelings at that point. You’re going to jail. Don’t try to be a hero, don’t try to be a joker among your friends. There are consequences for this.”
In New Jersey, Franklin Township police said they will charge a 10-year-old student from the area with causing a false public alarm after a video circulated on social media that “showed a disturbing video from a school” in the district, according to the report. The department reported in a press release Wednesday. It was determined to be a potential threat, so all district buildings activated their security protocols, which included deploying law enforcement officers to each of the schools in the area.
And in South Carolina, 21 juveniles have been charged in connection with threats made against local schools this week, authorities said.
The South Carolina Law Enforcement Division is aware of more than 60 threats targeting schools in 23 counties since Sept. 4, according to The agency reported in a press release on Tuesday, which was called in for assistance in six investigations into threats to schools, each in a different county.
One possible cause of the rise in violent threats in schools could be attributed to peer contagion, which occurs when two people influence each other to behave or act in a certain way through aggression, harassment, carrying weapons, etc., according to research.
“In some ways, by making it so public, it could become a badge of honour,” says Uhls. “There could be peers copying other peers.”
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