PICKENS — Three students have been arrested after threats against Pickens High School were posted on social media websites, inciting panic and prompting school district officials to add security to Thursday’s classes.
Pickens Police Chief Travis Riggs said the threats were posted Wednesday night.
A 17-year-old Junior from the school, Dan Darville, was arrested and charged with Student Making Threats Against a School.
He will be tried as an adult, Riggs said.
Two additional suspects, Austin Manuel Luis Morales and Tony Silvestre Vazquez-Vasquez, were also arrested after investigators said rather than alert the authorities, the teens “blasted this on social media, adding to the panic.”
Vazquez-Vasquez has been charged with conspiracy and making a school threat.
“The Pickens Police Department has continued to investigate the highly publicized incident involving threats disseminated on social media, late last night, involving Pickens High School,” the department stated in a release on Thursday. “As previously released, a Pickens High School student identified as Dan Darville was arrested and has been detained throughout the day at the Pickens County Detention Center for threats of violence posted on social media. The content of those messages indicated that acts of violence would occur at Pickens High School sometime today (Thursday).”
The department stated they are unable to reveal all of the facts of the investigation at this time but that there was evidence and information that the two co-defendants — Austin Morales and Tony Vazquez-Vazquez — took parts of the original post and added additional content that was false.
Authorities say the two then participated in a deliberate process to “create additional fear and concerns for our students, the faculty and the school district administration.”
“Unfounded rumors and speculation continue to spread about the incident and the Police Department wants to reassure the student population as well as all members of our community that our students are safe and that we always exercise every caution to minimize any risks at our schools however small that they might be,” Riggs said. “We understand the curiosity that surrounds an investigation of this nature and we want to share as much information that we can without compromising the integrity of the case but yet protecting these students’ rights to a fair and impartial trial.”
“I ask that you join the Pickens Police Department in praying for the three students that have been charged in this incident in hopes that other young adults will learn from this incident and understand that there are severe consequences to poor decisions,” said Riggs.
