Online Reporting System Prevents Indiana School Shooting

A national online threat reporting system for schools helped avert a mass shooting at an Indiana high school this month, according to a recent news release.

Court documents show that a tip to the Sandy Hook Promise Say Something Anonymous Reporting System stated that a friend was planning a Feb. 14 shooting at Mooresville High School, had just ordered a bulletproof vest and had access to an AR-15 semi-automatic rifle.

Say Something Crisis Counselors received the tip on Feb. 11 and reported it to the FBI. It included messages from a chat application called Discord in which the suspect wrote, “Parkland part two … I’ve been planning this for a YEAR.”

The FBI confirmed the threat was credible and alerted local authorities the same day. Officers searched the suspect’s home on Feb. 12 and found ammunition, written threats and a bedroom pasted with pictures of murderers, according to the affidavit for probable cause. The suspect, a Mooresville High School senior, was arrested and charged that day.

It’s the 17th credible school shooting prevented by a tip to Say Something since the program launched in 2018, according to Sandy Hook Promise, a nonprofit that developed the free, anonymous reporting system and its responding crisis center to protect children from harm.

The no-cost system offers three ways for students to report potential threats: an app, a website and a hotline. Trained counselors, available around the clock, vet each tip and alert authorities as necessary. More than 120 school districts across the U.S. use the system, according to the Sandy Hook Promise website.

Students in districts that implement the system also receive free training on how to spot the signs, especially on social media, that a classmate may be at risk of harming themselves or others — and the importance of reporting it immediately.

The prevention of a mass shooting at Mooresville High School is a reminder that such training can save lives, according to Sandy Hook Promise co-founder Nicole Hockley, whose son Dylan was killed in the Sandy Hook Elementary School tragedy in 2012.

“The outcome from these events in Mooresville provides renewed hope that we can end school shootings,” Hockley said in a public statement. “Learn the warning signs of violence and become an upstander in prevention, rather than a bystander to violence.”