Wyandotte Police Chief Says He Recommended Not to Evacuate Roosevelt During Bomb Threat

said Thursday that it was his recommendation not to evacuate when a

"You get near the holidays, test-taking time, and the end of the year and schools get these bomb threats," Grant said. "I didn’t truly think there was anything to it. To evacuate the whole school, I thought, was just absolutely ludicrous."

After two students noticed the threat at about 10:25 a.m., the school was put on lockdown, meaning classroom doors were locked and students were precluded from leaving their rooms until the all-clear was given at about 11:15 a.m.

for not removing the students from the building during the ordeal and for taking too long to notify parents of the situation.

“Getting an email four hours after the fact does not help me one bit knowing my kid is on a lockdown from a bomb threat,” she wrote on the Wyandotte Patch Facebook page. “Why would you keep kids in school looking for a "possible" bomb? What happens next time there’s a real bomb? Are the parents gonna get an email saying our kids are either dead or seriously injured four hours after the fact? … I’m sorry, but Roosevelt needs better "protocol" than what they have now.”

Jackie Meredith said she questions why students were kept inside the very building where the threat was made.

"If there is a threat of a bomb inside the school, why would you lock down the students inside of the area of the threat?" she wrote on the Wyandotte Patch Facebook page. "Why does this make sense to someone? They should have been evacuated to a (safe) area outside of the school building. It seems they used protocol that would be effective if there was a possible shooter in the building. If there was a bomb in that building, every student locked down in a room would have been gravely in danger. The plan of action used by RHS for this situation is very disturbing."

Grant said he's aware of the criticisms, but doesn't believe any student was ever in any danger on Wednesday.

"Trust me, if I thought there was any credibility to it, we would have taken every absolute precaution," he said. "The district had looked at the potential of evacuating, but my advice to them was evacuating at this time would have been a real bad idea."

Grant said he supports the decision made by school officials to notify parents of the threat via email once everything was back to normal, rather than during the situation.

"If you let the parents know right away, then you have a bunch of screaming parents running down to the school, which only causes another situation that needs to be controlled," he said.

School superintendent Carla Harting said emails were sent out alerting parents of the situation as soon as it was feasible to do so. An email from Roosevelt Principal Patrick Hickey obtained by Wyandotte Patch shows it was sent to parents at 2:11 p.m.

The email reads:

This morning, two students reported a written statement found on a bathroom wall using the word “bomb”.  The building was put into immediate lockdown per district and building protocol; the police were called to assess the seriousness of the threat.  The Chief of Police, Detective Sergeant and Patrol Officers arrived and determined that the threat was not credible and approved lifting the lockdown.   

I appreciate the professionalism of our entire staff and the maturity of our students during the lockdown.  We would also like to thank the Wyandotte Police Department for their immediate response and assistance.

For the first time since the incident occurred, officials are acknowledging that they have known from the onset who likely is responsible for the threat.

"We have a pretty good idea of who is responsible and we are pursuing it," Grant said. "Immediately after, we had a good idea, but that's all I can say for now. ... We will pursue it further and if we find out who is responsible, they will face some very serious charges."