Highlands threats lead to charges against juvenile, police say
A juvenile has been charged in connection with threats made against the Highlands School District on Tuesday, according to Harrison police.
The threat, made on social media against the district, was investigated by Harrison police and deemed unfounded, according to the school district.
Because the suspect is a juvenile, and being charged as such, police Chief Brian Turack said he was unable to identify the suspect.
The juvenile is expected to be charged with terroristic threats, causing or risking a catastrophe, and harassment, all misdemeanors.
Turack said Harrison police were notified of the threat, made on social media platform Snapchat, at about 5:45 p.m. Tuesday.
“It was a nonspecific, noncredible threat,” Turack said. “It was very general and broad.”
The threat had no specific time, date or location.
Turack said his agency, Tarentum police, Highlands School District administrators and the FBI worked in conjunction for the investigation.
“The officers worked very diligently to investigate the situation, as we take these threats very seriously,” he said.
That investigation led to police determining a person of interest, who was interviewed at the Harrison police station around 10 p.m. Tuesday.
“The results of that investigation indicated that a juvenile had sent the message out,” Turack said.
Turack said authorities updated the community on the situation via the app Savvy Citizen. He thanked the community for its assistance during the incident.
As a precaution, an increased police presence was at all district schools Wednesday.
The Highlands incident is one of a recent flurry of threats made against local schools.
Investigations continue into threats made against the Burrell and Fox Chapel Area school districts on Monday. Both districts completed a virtual learning day Tuesday because of the threats. No arrests have been announced in either of those cases.
Lower Burrell police Chief John Marhefka said the investigation into the threats made against Burrell High School is “moving in a positive direction.”
“This is a work in progress due to the volume of search warrants needed for all the platforms,” he said.
Kellen Stepler is a TribLive reporter covering the Allegheny Valley and Burrell school districts and surrounding areas. He joined the Trib in April 2023. He can be reached at kstepler@triblive.com.
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