Two Seattle-area high schools cancel classes after threats

[February 28, 2015]  By Eric M. Johnson and Victoria Cavaliere
 
 SEATTLE (Reuters) - Two Seattle-area high schools were evacuated and later canceled classes on Friday after receiving security threats, and another high school in Washington state heightened its security after a threatening message was scrawled on a bathroom wall.

The scares follow recent shootings in public places, including schools and theaters, that have fueled an ongoing national debate over gun control laws in the United States.

Interlake High School in the Seattle suburb of Bellevue was put on lockdown and classroom doors were locked with students inside after administrators were told of an anonymous threat of a school shooting on campus, the Bellevue School District said in a statement on its website. Later, Interlake canceled classes for the day, it said, adding all students and staff were safe.

"At this time the District and the Bellevue Police Department have made the decision to close Interlake High for the remainder of the school day and to release students," a statement said.

In Des Moines, a city south of Seattle, Mount Rainier High school students were evacuated to nearby schools on Friday morning after the school received a bomb threat, an official with the Highline School District said.

She said all students were safe and were dismissed early as police worked to secure the building. It was deemed safe around midday and staff and students were allowed back inside to gather belongings.

In Puyallup, about 40 miles (64 km) south of Seattle, Rogers High School held classes amid tightened security after a threat against the school was found on Thursday scrawled on a bathroom wall, school officials said.

Students completed their day without incident on Friday, a school official said. The Pierce County Sheriff's Department said it had no further information on the ongoing investigation.

In a twist, a school in Florence, Alabama, by the same name, Rogers High School, was closed on Friday after school officials confused the threat in Washington state as being directed at their campus, local news website AL.com reported.

Last October, a 15-year-old student opened fire on a cafeteria gathering of his cousins and three close friends at Marysville-Pilchuck High School, an hour's drive north of Seattle, fatally shooting four teenagers before taking his own life.

(Reporting by Eric M. Johnson and Victoria Cavaliere in Seattle; Editing by Lisa Lambert, James Dalgleish and Eric Beech)

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