Juvenile in custody after threats made to Watsonville school

WATSONVILLE, Calif. (KION-TV): -- A 13-year-old boy is in custody after making a shooting threat toward a Watsonville School.

Watsonville Police say detectives were notified about the threat and that it indicated the shooting would happen Wednesday morning.

The threat was directed towards Rolling Hills Middle School. News of a shooting threat spread like wildfire on social media. Turns out the 13-year old told an other student he would shoot up the school Wednesday, and that student passed it along to the school.

The Pajaro Valley Unified School District then notified Watsonville Police. The district sent out a call to parents last night and then Wednesday a letter about the incident. However, some parents say they needed to know quicker and although police determined no one else was involved still roughly 100 parents decided to keep their student home.

“You just don’t know so for me for piece of my mind I kept my student home so I wouldn’t worry what if?" parent Arika Morgan said.

This isn’t the first time the school district has had to deal with a similar on campus threat. Just this year across the central coast there have been several violent threats made by students. For that reason, the PVUSD adopted a safety plan several years ago.

“Whether or not we feel it's credible or not we investigate it to make sure the safety of our students is paramount so unfortunately we’ve had to use it multiple times. Luckily it has either resulted in us preempting something or resulting in it not being credible,” PVUSD Superintendent Dr. Michelle Rodriguez said.

Watsonville PD had extra patrols around campus, Wednesday.

The 13-year-old was booked into juvenile hall and upon search of the juvenile's home, no weapon was found.

Detectives believe he is the only person behind the threats.