Police agencies in at least four cities in Texas responded to a rash of hoax calls reporting active shooters at area colleges on Thursday morning.
Plano Police said they responded to a call about a mass shooting at Collin College’s Plano campus at about 9:45 a.m. Officers rushed to the school and searched the campus but found no sign of a shooting or any injured people.
At Texas Wesleyan University in Fort Worth, students and faculty were told to shelter in place due to an emergency situation on campus. The university said Fort Worth Police responded and searched the campus but found no evidence of an emergency.
Texas A&M Police in College Station said reports of an active shooter at the Health Science Center on Thursday were a hoax and that there was no active threat to the campus.
In East Texas, KETK-TV reported multiple people were said to have been shot inside a technology building at Tyler Junior College at about 10:30 a.m. Tyler Police arrived at the school and searched the campus but found no evidence that a shooting took place.
Last month, the Associated Press reported a spate of threats and false reports of shooters had been pouring into schools and colleges across the country for months, raising concerns among law enforcement and elected leaders.
WHAT IS SWATTING?
THE FBI says “swatting” is the act of making a hoax call to 911 to draw a response from law enforcement, usually a SWAT team.
Hundreds of cases of swatting occur annually, with some callers using spoofing technology to disguise their numbers.
An FBI official said in November 2022 that they believe the wave of false threats focused on schools may be coming from outside of the country. The agency said in March that they were monitoring the reports of swatting cases nationwide.
“While we have no information to indicate a specific and credible threat, we will continue to work with our local, state, and federal law enforcement partners to gather, share, and act upon threat information as it comes to our attention,” the statement said.
Few regions of the country have been spared from such calls and the disruptions they cause. The false calls lead to lockdowns or evacuations in schools or public areas as law enforcement must take each call seriously.
