If you thought the April Fools story about a South Carolina mom texting her daughter that there was a shooting at her college was terrible, a student at Roxana Junior and Senior High School in Illinois is about to make us all bang our heads against our walls. At around 1 PM yesterday, the school was evacuated after police had been informed of a text message that the unidentified student had sent to a parent, claiming that shots had been fired at the school. According to KTVI, officers from “at least 10 police departments responded” to the threat, and the 950 students were put on lockdown.
“This is very emotionally stressing for me,” said Tanea Berry, the parent of a fourteen year old freshman. “This is crazy you have 500 parents out here about to have a panic attack over an April Fool`s joke.”
Students in the cafeteria were told to evacuate to a park and community center nearby.
“People were jumping the fences, people were freaking out, scared cause we thought we were going to get shot,” said Devn Reinke, a freshman.
Other students remained in their locked classrooms, huddled away from the doors. (Via KTVI)
Terrified and anxious parents waited at a nearby church for updates, before the police eventually decided around 2:20 that there had been no gunfire. Students were then able to leave and meet their parents, so they could all discuss the brand new lesson they learned thanks to one insanely terrible April Fools’ Day joke.