[UPDATED] All Los Angeles Public Schools Closed Because of 'Credible Terror Threat'

More details coming soon

Wikimedia Commons

Officials closed all public schools in the Los Angeles Unified School District on Tuesday due to a "credible terrorist threat," KTLA reports.

According to The Los Angeles Times, a bomb threat was called into a member of the school board.

No other details regarding the nature of threat have been made public yet. All students already at school are currently being set home. School administrators will hold a news conference as soon as that operation is complete.

LAUSD is the second largest school district in the country—some 650,000 kids are affected by the closings.

Check back for more updates.

Updated at 10:45 a.m.: Superintendent Ramon Cortines said the threat was made against many schools, not just one. He also said the threat referenced "backpacks, other packages."

Updated at 12:45 p.m.: A former chief of the LA police department criticized district officials for panicking so quickly. New York City schools and several other districts received the same threat but concluded it was a hoax and did not cancel classes.

Comments

[Enjoy Every Sandwich]

Has the president and/or cable news channels politicized this yet?

[Derp-o-Matic 5000]

What this country needs is common-sense backpack reform

[SOFL Hockey Fan]

Background checks on backpack purchases....now!

[Derp-o-Matic 5000]

No more semi-automatic military-style backpacks for civilian use! No one needs a backpack like that!

[SOFL Hockey Fan]

We should regulate carrying a backpack just as we regulate driving a car.

[MSimon]

Hoodies. Definitely hoodies.

[PapayaSF]

I saw a backpack with a camouflage pattern! Call the authorities!

[Fun at Parties]

But how could you SEE it? Those things are like invisibility cloaks mannnn.

[CE]

If it would make just one child safer, shouldn't we ban schools?

[Hugh Akston]

Prediction: there will be no bombs.

[Restoras]

Seconded. But there will be pant's shitting.

[Lord Humungus]

Dry Cleaners of the world rejoice

[Private Chipperbot]

"There will be no bombs dropped here." General Stillwell.

[Ken Shultz]

Speculation time?

I'm goin' with somebody wasn't ready to take a test today.

I wonder if the incidence of people calling in bomb threats becasue they're late for a plane has gone down since 9/11.

Or it might be negatively correlated with the disappearance of the public phone.

[jdd6y]

Right? It is only finals week. "Credible threat" is likely an email from a library computer. LAUSD typically makes daily "credible threats" to waste 12 years of incarceration and turn out mediocre retail workers.

[CE]

LA TV said it was an email threat, from outside the US.

[Jan S.]

Some savvy kid got out of a test today...

[Just say Nikki]

Blowback for imprisoning 650k students, perhaps?

[SugarFree]

There's no such thing as blowback, Nikki. People never respond to the things you do to them.

[Hugh Akston]

Don't you ever read the terrorism threads nicole? There's no such thing as blowback. Public schooling is just an inherently violent ideology.

[SugarFree]

Some people are just born hating America and some are not. Nothing America does or doesn't do affects their willingness to act against us.

[Free Market Socialist $park?]

They hate us for our freedumbs.

[MSimon]

Latest evidence in is that they do not like government workers having Christmas parties.

[Just say Nikki]

That's true, it is.

[Hugh Akston]

Look, just because they coerce kids into attending and then indoctrinate them into a brutal and demeaning culture doesn't mean that...

...maybe that wasn't the best analogy I ever made.

[Jimbo]

I pay extra for that!

[kbolino]

There's no such thing as blowback.

This has to be one of the stupidest debate points on this site, and that's saying something. Both the "everything is blowback" and "no such thing as blowback" crowds are full of fucking morons. Both statements are trivially refuted by saying "people have agency".

[Zeb]

I don't think blowback implies that people lack agency. I look at it this way: it being a real phenomenon doesn't imply that that those suffering the blowback had it coming or that the blow-backers are somehow justified. People do things for reasons. Trying to find reasons beyond "they are evil" isn't victim blaming. People still bear responsibility for their actions.

[PapayaSF]

Agreed. Too often "blowback" is just an excuse to blame the US/Westerners/Christians for Middle East crap. Which, of course, have been going on since before there was a US, or even Christianity.

[Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer]

I ain't gonna make jokes. Our own Playa - and probably others - has kids in the L.A. school system, no?

[Hugh Akston]

No, they're all at home today.

[Zeb]

I'm gonna guess that Playa doesn't do public schools.

I'm afraid I just can't take it seriously. I can remember 3 or 4 bomb threats from high school, none of which were anything. So I'm inclined to think it was a student doing a prank or trying to get out of a test.

[Derp-o-Matic 5000]

Back when my older siblings were in high school in the pre-Columbine days, there would be bomb threats on nearly a weekly basis.

[the other Jim]

I think that is the most likely explanation, too. But for what it's worth, the WaPo is saying "Cortines said he intends to have every one of the district's schools searched. He said that while it is not unusual for schools to receive threats, this one was "rare" and comes at a time of heightened concern about safety."

Maybe "rare" just means "We're on edge because of San Bernadino now." I have a hard time believing real terrorists would notify their target of an impending attack.

[DenverJ]

The IRA used to warn of upcoming bombings. Buy they were good Catholic terrorists, not mooslims

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

Zeb, I do. I've already paid for it, so I accept the free babysitting. I teach them what they need to know at home/

When my 1 year old is finally in Kindergarten, I'll actually be a drain on the system, temporarily.

[jesse.in.mb]

Different school system. The district he's in had two shut downs for bullshit threats last week, which I'm guessing (at least subconsciously) inspired this one.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Snow day.

[Garth Bigelow]

How many flakes makes it a snow day in LA?

[SugarFree]

So a $10 burner from 7/11 gets 650,000 out of kid jail for a day? What a bargain.

Just a penny per kid would get them all the next couple of school years off...

[Just say Nikki]

Kickstarter. For the children.

[SugarFree]

How many school districts are there? How much to get all the children of America a day of freedom?

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

If you can find a way to stop the teachers from getting paid, I'm on board.

[Jimbo]

You are a savage, aren't you? Of course it's "Paid Leave!"

[Suthenboy]

Good grief.

Exhibit #4582390 showing how the 'you have a greater chance of being hit by lightning than you do of being killed by a terrorist' don't understand what the purpose of terrorism is or how it works.

[Restoras]

But the government kept you safe for a day! You can't deny it didn't!

[Suthenboy]

You aren't the boss of me!

*stomps foot*

[dbw1977]

You want this to happen less, tort reform. Can you imagine the legal liability *if* something did happen. 6 dead kids during a known terror threat would be a case for a minimum 9 figure settlement.

Easier to get them out of school than face the press and legal liabilities.

[Garth Bigelow]

And 450,000+ pages of new government expanding legislation.

[Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer]

That's my take. You get a threat, you evacuate. I don't necessarily see it as giving into fears. Yes. The statistics show the probabilities are low but they are kids after all. Meh. Maybe I'm just talking as a father here. I have a 10 year-old in school so I'd probably be okay with it.

[Zeb]

I see it more like streaking at a baseball game, or bank robberies (which are apparently pretty common and not that hard to get away with). You don't show it or talk about it too much or more people will start doing it.

[Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer]

For sure. But I'm not gonna begrudge officials for not taking chances. I'm pretty sure they're not interested in making this habit. I hope.

[Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer]

a habit.

[mad.casual]

Meh. Maybe I'm just talking as a father here. I have a 10 year-old in school so I'd probably be okay with it.

Nope, if the bomb is already at the school many layers of shitty bureaucracy at all kinds of levels have already fucked up.

[R C Dean]

You get a threat, you evacuate.

Sounds like the kind of zero-thought approach that we excoriate in school administration.

Plus, truly adopting this would mean that your school system is shut down.

[Just say Nikki]

We know how it works. Part of why we think people shouldn't be so afraid of it is so they won't react like this.

[(??o?)???]????]

All the payoffs of terrorism, none of the hard work actually making and planting bombs.

[PapayaSF]

+1

[dajjal]

And this is why we must destroy ISIS. Do you get it now?

[Free Market Socialist $park?]

Rico, you need an editor. The threat was called in to a member.

[SugarFree]

How did a penis talk on the phone, moron?

[Free Market Socialist $park?]

You've never heard of a dictaphone? And I'm the moron?

[SugarFree]

Your penis is a vein retard.

[Free Market Socialist $park?]

Then it doesn't make sense to be calling into it, does it idiot?

[Ceci n'est pas un woodchipper]

Look, it might spend a little too much time in the mirror but I'll have you know it graduated summa cum laude.

[PACW]

Sending all the children home.

How many of these children have parents at work and no way to get into their homes?

I can be arrested for leaving my eight year old home alone; is it possible for the school district to make sure every student is being handed over to a responsible adult?

School districts have staggered start and end times in part to use their busses efficiently, how are they transporting all these children at once?

Everybody wants to 'think about the children' but very few think about logistics.

[Restoras]

How many of these children have parents at work and no way to get into their homes?

Feature, not a bug? Proof that parents shouldn't be raising kids, the government should?

[PACW]

I'm not quite that paranoid yet. I still attribute most things to incompetence rather than evilness. But as more than one person here has asked, "Why not both?"

[Just say Nikki]

The kids never got to school today. This happened hours before schools opened and buses were turned around before picking up children.

[PACW]

Ah, I missed that.

[CE]

Lots of kids were dropped off at school already. the alert went out at 7:18 AM.

[morganovich]

i'm curious:

does anyone who ever actually plants a bomb then call in to tell the victim about it?

this seems like a pretty bad way to go about terrorizing people.

[SugarFree]

The IRA did, when seeking property damage and not mass casualties.

[B.P.]

I believe the Basques do it routinely, too.

[Free Market Socialist $park?]

The threat referenced backpacks? Clever.

[Jordan]

Who's the hero kid who accomplished this?

[buybuydandavis]

So half a million kids have now learned how they can skip school for a day.

No more pencils no more books no more teachers dirty looks

[Derp-o-Matic 5000]

Schoooooool's out for summer! Schooooooooooool's out for ever! School's been blown to pieces!

[DJF]

Look at the good side, maybe more then half of million children will learn something today.

[Free Market Socialist $park?]

Like the difference between then and than?

[SOFL Hockey Fan]

NYC schools received the same threat and deemed it was not "credible".

[SOFL Hockey Fan]

This just in: Classroom prank.

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

I'm out of the country, and my kids are staying with my parents. I got a call this morning. Yes, send the fuckers to school.

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

Some backstory on this: my school district had 2 threats last week. One on Monday that closed the high school, and another one on Thursday that closed the high school and an elementary school.

Somebody learned how easy it is to make the puppets dance and decided to up their game.

Expect a lot more of this until arrests are made.

[MJGreen - Docile Citizen]

I was going to say, "It's unseasonably warm and it's nearly Christmas break, so why not call in some threats and get the last few days of the year off?" But this is LA, and it's actually warmer in NYC right now.

[Pl?ya Manhattan.]

Ok, just checked my email. 3 from school administrators, including a pre school. This is pure hysteria.

[Steven Rush]

Yes if you are going to bomb someone, then always increases your chances of a successful bombing to let them know beforehand so they can prepare.

But at the same time, you know if they don't shut down all the schools and anything happens, all the dumb people are going to blame whoever is in charge of shutting them down or not....so probably a safe move.

And public school is just glorified babysitting anyway. Kids won't miss a thing by staying home one day. Let them have some fun.

[kbolino]

And public school is just glorified babysitting anyway. Kids won't miss a thing by staying home one day. Let them have some fun.

I have no problem with this attitude as long as we do away with public funding. All of this theater isn't free, you know.

[mad.casual]

Yes if you are going to bomb someone, then always increases your chances of a successful bombing to let them know beforehand so they can prepare.

This was my first thought. My other thought was that if you wanted to make sure you killed zero kids but as many people on the other side of the thin blue line as possible...

[MJGreen - Docile Citizen]

It's just like terrorists to call in bomb threats before detonating the bombs.