Jacksonville School District 117 and the Jacksonville Police department have been working overnight to investigate a possible threat that was made on social media of gun violence at the high school.
According to an email communication from Superintendent of Schools Steve Ptacek early this morning, a social media post went viral in which an individual made a threat of gun violence at a “JHS”.
Ptacek says the Jacksonville Police Department has been working on this all night and into this morning. He says the threatening message that went viral is a screenshot that is very blurry and looks like it includes the letters JHS. However, there has been one name attached to the original image and that name is not associated with Jacksonville High School in District 117.
The Jacksonville Police Department in coordination with other agencies has tracked the origin of this post to somewhere around Savannah Georgia.
Ptacek says a local Savannah news agency covered this story yesterday. The JPD has determined that this is not a credible threat to Jacksonville High School. It was even called a hoax by the Savannah news agency.
Ptacek says he completely understands the concern that parents and students have, as he is also a parent of a JHS student. However, he asks the public to please understand that social media allows for one post somewhere else in the country to become viral and impact the entire nation.
He says a couple of years ago District 117 had a similar event in which someone threatened Jacksonville High School. It turned out that post was made in Jacksonville Arkansas.
Ptacek says this most recent threat didn’t even include the word Jacksonville, the original post only included the letters JHS.