Schools across Pike County went under lockdown after receiving multiple threats Monday morning.
The McComb School District placed all of its campuses under lockdown twice Monday morning after receiving at least two threats.
A message from schools sent to parents and circulated on social media said school officials received a threat of a shooting to be carried out at one of the campuses, although no campus was specified.
McComb Police Chief Juan Cloy said police made an arrest in connection to that threat, but school officials received a second threat after that and initiated another lockdown.
Information about the person arrested was not immediately available. Cloy deferred other questions to McComb School District Security Director Marcus Gatlin, who did not return a message. McComb School District Interim Superintendent Betty Wilson-McSwain was not immediately available for comment.
Some campuses, including Otken Elementary School and Denman Junior High School, were evacuated.
Otken employees and students were seen walking from Douglas Park along Gay Street back to campus under the escort of two police cars and the fire department, with an unmarked unit parked on a nearby side street, as a lockdown ended there around 11:30 a.m. Monday.
Meanwhile at Denman Junior High School, police cruisers blocked access to the campus from Louisiana Avenue as a long line of cars belonging to parents waiting to pick up students formed on West Street.
South Pike School District officials said in a message sent to parents that its campuses also had been locked down due to threats.
Magnolia Police Chief Sonya Woodall said a lockdown on campuses there ended early Monday afternoon after the threat had been determined to be a hoax, and she remained on campus in her patrol car “just to make them feel safe” for the remainder of the school day.
All extracurricular activities at South Pike were canceled for the remainder of the day.
Woodall said the threat that prompted the lockdown at South Pike could have been related to the ones in McComb, noting the intense athletic rivalry between the two.
“Every time South Pike and McComb get ready to play ball, we start getting these threats,” she said.
McComb’s and South Pike’s junior high basketball teams were scheduled to play each other in McComb on Monday.
“I want to say that all of that is going to be connected,” she said.
Woodall said no one had been arrested in connection with the threats called in to South Pike.
She also reported throngs of parents waiting in line to pick up students at South Pike schools, which Woodall said hinders the police response when lockdowns are in effect.
“What we need these parents to understand is everyone wants to run to the school and check their children out and they’re putting themselves and their children at risk,” she said. “The children on campus are safer than you are out here on these streets.”
Woodall said police are trying to identify who should and should not be on campus when lockdowns are in place, and a parent defying a lockdown order could be perceived as a threat.
“You put yourself at risk of getting hurt,” she said. “We have to take every threat like it’s serious.”
No threats were reported at any other school. North Pike officials said online that its schools were not locked down on Monday.
