3 Westchester school districts have received false threats this week

The CEO of Altaris Consulting Group, a Yorktown Heights-based business that helps school districts with emergency planning, says while scary this trend isn't uncommon.

News 12 Staff

Sep 30, 2021, 12:29 AM

Updated 1,108 days ago

Share:

Three Westchester school districts have received false threats in the last two days.
On Wednesday afternoon, state police received an anonymous call about a shooting at the Blind Brook High School, which turned out to be nothing, but police continue to investigate.
Earlier in the day, a bomb threat was called into the Yonkers Middle-High School forcing an evacuation.
And on Tuesday, Mount Vernon High School also received a bomb threat forcing an early dismissal.
The CEO of Altaris Consulting Group, a Yorktown Heights-based business that helps school districts with emergency planning, says while it may be alarming, this trend isn't uncommon.
"We do go through periods of time throughout the school year where we do see upticks in certain types of threats towards schools. Fortunately, in the vast majority if not all the cases, they turn out to be non-credible," says John LaPlaca, of Altaris Consulting Group.
Whether it’s one person or several copying the others, LaPlaca says these calls are meant to disrupt the day, cause alarm and annoyance.
He believes detectives have the technology to find the person or people who did this.
“In many cases, law enforcement has done a phenomenal job in making arrests in these particular situations and I think that’s critically important,” he says.
Blind Brook officials say additional police will be outside the school on Thursday morning as an added level of security.