SPOKANE VALLEY, Wash. – The Spokane County Sheriff's Office is investigating a threat made towards University High School on Wednesday morning.
Tuesday, both Jefferson Elementary School in Spokane and Betz Elementary School in Cheney received bomb threats, making this the second day in a row that bomb threats pushed local schools into lockdowns.
Spokane Police said that Wednesday's threat at University High School was not related to the threat at Jefferson Elementary on Tuesday, but could not comment on the threat at Betz Elementary School because the Cheney Police Department is handling that investigation.
"I got a text and a phone call, saying that U-high was in lockdown kids are safe," said Bonnie Medlock, a parent of a University High School student. "Then I got a text saying Chester's in lockdown kids are safe and Horizon was in lockdown, so I was panicking because I got kids at all three schools."
The Spokane County Sheriff's Office said the threat came into University High School via email just before 9:00 a.m.
However, some students received a photo sent on Snapchat while they were still in school of a whiteboard with what appeared to be a threat. Deputies later told KREM 2 News that the whiteboard with the words "Bomb Threat" was never found during a search of the school.
"It was weird, I thought it was just an April Fools joke kind of thing, but then there was the phone call so it was weird," said Medlock.
Whether or not the message written on the white board was a joke, it created confusion over a real threat that evacuated the high school and sent two other nearby schools into lockdown.
Deputies spent hours checking the school and cars in the parking lot. Three police dogs were also called in to check the school as well.
"We need to make sure the grounds, all the cars, the building itself, everything has been checked," said Deputy Mark Gregory with the Spokane County's Sheriff's Office.
All of the students were bused to Valley Point Church a few blocks away to be picked up by parents while the threat was investigated.
The investigations into all three bomb threats are still ongoing.
Deputies said it is a very large building so it took a lot of time to go through every room.
University High School has been cleared though and is now back open.
Students had to leave their backpacks and cars behind. Staff said students have until 6:30 p.m. Wednesday to pick up their cars.
All after school activities were cancelled Wednesday, but school will be back to normal on Thursday.
