By Brian Zanzonico
But with patrol cars parked outside the building and police on foot inside and around the school perimeter, the school day concluded without incident. "Thank God it was a rumor and there was no activity, no shooting, no rumble, no fight," Interim Superintendent Warren Meierdiercks said.
On Oct. 12, rumors swirled around Sewanhaka High School that an outsider was coming to the campus on Oct. 21, and would be armed and planned to start shooting, Meierdiercks said. School officials immediately notified police, and an investigation began. A girl who started the rumor apparently revealed the person's name, and he was spoken to by police, Meierdiercks said. Calls to Principal Debra Lidowsky and the Sewanhaka PTA co-presidents were not returned.
Sgt. Ed Grim of the Nassau County 5th Precinct said police spoke to the teen and his parents, but all the information that circulated around the school was "erroneous," since it was "an old rumor that resurfaced."
"It was unsubstantiated," Grim said of the threat. "There was no substance behind it. No incident behind it. It was just a rumor that got legs."
Meierdiercks said the person who made the threat does not attend a district school, and that the person told the Sewanhaka student he was "unhappy and unsatisfied" and planned to open fire at the school, in Floral Park. "The young lady brought the rumor into school that her friend was going to do this and this," Meierdiercks said. "Then word spread."
When news reached teachers and Lidowsky, Meierdiercks said, he was called and the police were notified. There was a police presence in the building, and the principal and vice principal visited classrooms and spoke to students about the threat, Meierdiercks explained.
Once news of the threat spread to students' homes, Meierdiercks's office was flooded with calls from concerned parents. He informed them that the police were involved and an investigation was under way. "How can they not be concerned?" Meierdiercks said.
Some Sewanhaka parents said last week that the shooting at an Amish school in Nickel Mines, Pa., prompted them to keep their children home from school on Oct. 21. Others lauded the school administration's handling of the threat. "Even though students all knew about it, the school could have kept it quiet," said a parent who requested anonymity. "But they were open about it and addressed the students, and that kept everyone cool."
Since Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold killed 12 fellow students, a teacher and themselves at Columbine High School in Colorado in 1999, the Sewanhaka district has taken threats of violence against the school "110 percent" more seriously than before Columbine, Meierdiercks said. Since Columbine, there have been 26 shooting incidents at schools in the U.S. and Canada.
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