“There is no threat to society, and as with all threats of violence, our top priority is to keep the community safe,” Blue Springs police said in a press release Wednesday morning.
Prosecutors have not yet made official charges, but speaking to reporters, a police sergeant in Blue Springs. Keegan Hughes has raised the possibility of being charged with terrorism, which is a crime.
Hughes described the suspect as a 19-year-old Blue Springs resident. He was identified with the help of the FBI, Hughes said.
Police received a report around 10:30 a.m. Tuesday on a suspicious post on Snapchat, according to a statement in which someone commented on the threat of “killing people – mass killings.”
The person was detained on Wednesday morning after an all-night surveillance.
The threat never mentioned a specific school, Hughes told reporters on Wednesday, describing it as a “very general threat”.
Police shared the information with the local school district, Hughes said. Although police did not have a specific potential goal, they were aware of the summer programs and student safety was “paramount” for authorities, he said.
In response, the Blue Springs School District, which serves more than 14,000 students about 20 miles east of Kansas City, announced on Tuesday that it would cancel Wednesday’s activities “with great care.”
The decision came after Blue Springs police “warned the FBI of a possible threat of nonspecific mass shootings,” the statement said. It added: “The FBI has confirmed that the person in question, whose whereabouts are unknown, is dangerous.”
“We believe that the best course of action is to close our summer schools and all school programs until further notice,” it said.
In statements issued before police announced the suspect in custody, some districts noted that they had no information indicating that the threat was related to the relevant school communities. But they, like Blue Springs, chose to cancel their activities on Wednesday out of plenty of caution.
The FBI confirmed that it was informed of the threat by Blue Springs police in a statement to CNN, but directed additional questions to this department, which is the leading investigative agency.
“We take all threats of violence seriously and work with our local partners to provide resources if needed,” the FBI said in a statement.
CNN’s Kara Devlin and Chris Boyet contributed to this report.
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