Police arrest 15-year-old at Havre High

A 15-year-old was arrested Monday at Havre High School at 11:06 a.m. on pending intimidation charges and being held at the Cascade Juvenile Detention Center, says a release from the Havre Police Department issued Monday.

The subject of the release is “Threat at Havre High School,” and it was issued days after graffiti was found Thursday in the Havre High School bathroom saying a shooting would occur at the high school the next day. The threat spurred heavy police presence the next day at all public schools, and an investigation to find out who wrote it.

Havre Public Schools superintendent Andy Carlson said today that police presence has been scaled back at the schools, but the incident has changed things.

“No, things are not back to normal,” he said. “I’m not sure what normal is.”

Carlson referred questions about the arrest to the Havre Police Department.

Calls requesting comment on the arrest had not been returned as of printing deadline this morning.

In addition to felony intimidation, the suspect was arrested on a misdemeanor criminal mischief charge, the release says.

Police interviewed “numerous individuals throughout this investigation, reviewed lengthy surveillance material and has conducted a search of a local residence,” the release says.

The investigation is ongoing and is being referred to the Juvenile Probation Office and the Hill County Attorney’s Officer of formal charges.

The threat was reported Thursday at 3 p.m. after a student first saw that something was written on the back of a bathroom stall door in the men’s west restroom. The threat indicated that there would be a school shooting the next day, Friday.

The threat came just nine days after a gunman killed 17 students and educators at the Parkland, Florida, school Feb. 14, and two days after a group of students and parents gathered at the White House for a listening session on school safety and gun control.

Copycat threats are not uncommon following shootings like the one in Florida, Havre Police Chief Gabe Matosich said Friday. Similar threats had been statewide. Multiple Montana school district were investigating similar threats today made in their districts last week.