Archive

By Jorge Casuso

January 30 -- What turned out to be a prank call led to a lock down of Lincoln Middle School in Santa Monica Tuesday afternoon, with children hiding under desks and parents waiting anxiously outside.

The call that came at around 1 p.m. reported that two armed students were facing off in the pool area on campus, police said.

“There was a call saying a student had a gun and another student had a knife,” said Lt. Alex Padilla, the Police Department spokesman.

The caller, who “sounded like a female juvenile,” gave a classroom number that didn’t exist, the first hint that the call might be a false alarm, Padilla said.

But school officials and police were taking no chances. Soon, screens in the classrooms were flashing a message that a lockdown was underway at the campus at 1501 California Avenue in an upscale Santa Monica neighborhood.

Following emergency protocol, students ducked under their desks, witnesses reported. After the classroom areas were secured, the students were taken to a staging area at the corner of Euclid and California.

Parents, who were contacted by an automated dialing system, showed up and gathered outside the school gates, straining to spot their children and calling out their names as the students were escorted out in groups.

For more than four hours, the school, which has an enrolment of 1,283 students, was cordoned off as police combed the campus looking for the two subjects supposedly involved in the armed standoff.

“This was a prank,” Padilla said. “We searched the school and searched it.

“So far, nothing has been recovered, no one has been arrested, no one has been seen with anything resembling a gun or a knife,” Padilla said shortly after 5 p.m., as the police action was winding down.

The caller used a cell phone to contact the California Highway Patrol, Padilla said. But when police tried to trace the call, it “came back to a business line.”

“We couldn’t backtrack the call,” he said. “The CHP couldn’t backtrack it either.”

Shortly after securing the campus, a similar call was received regarding John Adams Middle
School, police said.

After collaboration between the police and the administration, students at the Pico Neighborhood campus were dismissed as usual, District officials said.

Police said it is important to take every precaution in light of highly publicized shootings on school campuses across the country.

“We have to take every one of these situations seriously in light of what has happened on other campuses,” Padilla said.

District officials praised the collaborative efforts between police, the PTA and site and District staff, which "focused on the safety and security of students and staff," said Deputy Superintendent Tim Walker.

"Lock down drills are practiced regularly at all schools, so this was a procedure that was familiar to all staff and students," Walker said.

"The District is thankful that no one was injured during the events of today and we will use
this incident as a learning opportunity to ensure that all of our schools are even more
prepared for any crisis," he said.

School will be open Wednesday and additional staff will be on both campuses to assist any children who require support to deal with Tuesday's events, District officials said.

Anyone with additional information should call the Santa Monica Police Department at 310.458.8427 (24 hours).