When 911 calls like the ones at Permian High School this week happen — whether they’re real or not — Ector County ISD Police Chief Jeff Daniels wants people to know a massive response is on the way.
Nearly every law enforcement agency in the area came out for the Aug. 21 and 22 incidents. The Texas Rangers are investigating along with ECISD police. These incidents are happening all over Texas and the rest of the nation.
Rep. Brooks Landgraf, R-Odessa, also wants to increase penalties for false reports of shootings or bombings at schools.
“We just want the parents of our students to know this is taken very serious. When we get these calls that come in it’s such a huge, overwhelming response from all law enforcement in our area to ensure our kids are safe; not just ECISD. We partner with everybody. We train with everybody. We do all we can to ensure our kids are as safe as possible and we want them to feel safe knowing that their children are with us throughout the day and that we’re able to protect them,” Daniels said.
“Yesterday (Monday) is a prime example of the response we see when our kids are threatened. Our community, we saw yesterday and they’ve seen in the past, our law enforcement community response — there’s no hesitation. Everybody comes; everybody helps,” Daniels added.
When incidents like the ones at PHS occur, it goes out in mass communication across their radio system.
“All of our radio systems are connected so it doesn’t matter if it’s our 911 center, the city’s, the sheriff’s department, UTPB’s in this case they’re the ones that received it, we’re all able to switch over and contact everybody on different channels and let them know what’s going on and where to respond,” Daniels said.
On Aug. 21, University of Texas Permian Basin dispatch received a 911 phone call stating there was an active shooter at Permian High School. UTPB notified all law enforcement agencies in this area, and all responded to PHS. Upon receiving the call, ECISD police placed the school in lockdown, an emergency response in which all people inside the school take shelter within a locked room and all campus activities stop. All safety procedures were followed and officers were able to clear the school of any threat, deem it safe, and release the lockdown. Law enforcement confirmed there was no shooter at Permian and there were no shots fired at the school, which was a claim made by the 911 caller.
The afternoon of Aug. 22, the Odessa Police Department received a bomb threat for PHS. Multiple law enforcement agencies responded and, with ECISD officers, began searching the school. Officers found two backpacks, however those were quickly confirmed to have been left by students and were cleared of suspicion. ECISD’s explosive K-9 officer and OPD’s explosive ordinance division also began a preliminary sweep of the campus. Officers also secured the exterior of the campus and then students and staff were evacuated.
At 4 p.m., the school initiated regular dismissal procedures. Some after-school activities resumed in areas of the campus already cleared by authorities during a second campus search. No explosives or suspicious items were found.
In the case of ECISD, all the first responders in the area are capable of getting into the schools the same way as an employee, through a scan card.
“A lot of them carry it in their pocket like we do,” Daniels said.
For large responses like the ones at PHS, Daniels said they go to a common radio channel.
“In this case it was OPD 1 and ECISD yesterday (Monday). We’ll notify all responding officers to go to a certain channel and all officers will operate off that channel,” he said.
The jurisdiction where the incident happens is who is in charge. So if it’s a school, ECISD ran the scene.
“But it’s a coordinated effort inside the command post where we have people from DPS; we have people from the sheriff’s department; from Odessa Police Department; and from UTPB; Medical Center police department. We’re all in there to assist in the overall planning,” Daniels said. “But it boils down to we oversee it because it’s our property. If it was the sheriff’s department … they would have overseen the whole command post. We would have been operating within it, assisting them, but it would be their scene,” Daniels said.
In every situation, Daniels said a command post is set up. It depends on what’s going on as to where it’s set up. On Aug. 21, it was in the front parking lot and then once the building was deemed safe it was moved inside.
Officers doing a visual and physical check of the building is how it was determined to be a hoax Monday.
Daniels said he doesn’t know how they would prevent hoaxes as in this case it was someone calling in.
“We do begin an initial validation trying to confirm it as fast as we can. We have people on scene who are stating what they’ve heard, or what they haven’t heard. That’s part of the initial validation to end … these hoaxes as fast as possible by not only law enforcement, but administrative and staff that are on scene so communication there, as well as closed circuit security camera system,” Daniels said.
“We have people who jump on and start monitoring it to look for things that could be going on. That’s a second level of confirmation we seek to verify we’re not seeing anything; we’re not seeing what was reported. Then third is the actual physical officer … moving through the campus ensuring that everybody is safe (and) that what was reported is truly a hoax, so it’s kind of a third tier,” Daniels said.
He noted that officers have been to Permian several times for incidents. Officers are learning where to go, what they’re doing and getting in there to help.
“We’re trying to cause the least amount of anxiety and traumatic response to kids that’s taking place,” Daniels said. “We’re trying to end that as fast as possible. We communicate very well amongst each other and with administration and out to staff, so there’s a lot of moving parts that are going on during these hoaxes to ease the minds of the people who are involved in them … We try to put their minds to rest as fast as we can (to say) hey it’s a hoax we’re here we’re dealing with it, you’re safe but we still go through the process of making sure it’s 100 percent safe before we release it.”
Whether it was artificial intelligence or an actual person is still under investigation. Daniels said they are working with the Texas Rangers on the probe.
Daniels added Aug. 23 that there is no exact charge yet and new charges are still being added.
If it was a minor that made the calls, Daniels said it depends on the circumstances whether parents will be held responsible.
“If it’s just a minor acting alone, then it’s the minor that will be held responsible,” Daniels said.
Current punishments for false calls are jail time and expulsion from school.
“We’re looking at enhancing this charge. It needs to be as impactful as we can make it. It creates a huge impact on our students and on our staff. The amount of emotional and mental trauma they go through because of these hoaxes really, really hampers our learning process,” Daniels said. “So if this is what’s going to take place, I want to make sure we have punishments to back up the crime that has been committed.”
Landgraf wants to amend the Texas penal code to increase the penalties for false reports of shootings or bomb threats at schools to a third-degree felony, punishable by 2 – 10 years in state prison, and hold the perpetrator liable for any costs incurred by law enforcement responding to the false report.
“I am prepared to return to the Texas Capitol in October for a special legislative session regarding public education. If this proposal is germane to Governor (Greg) Abbott’s call, I will work to change the law for this school year. If it is not germane to the call, I will file this bill and work to pass it when the legislature convenes for the next regular session in January 2025,” Landgraf said in a statement.
Talking to students about the penalties that come with making false reports like this will make them aware of the consequences.
“It’s just education there on campus … talking to them about the penalties that come behind things like this. Our kids are good kids and these aren’t typically the ones that are doing this type of hoax stuff. It’s just educating them and letting them know the penalties behind it. But also being there. They see the outcome. They see the trauma they go through. So that’s an educational process for themselves,” Daniels said.
Chief Communications Officer Mike Adkins said from the communication standpoint, when the district receives a message of a lockdown the first thing they do is call the ECISD police department to confirm it.
“Once confirmed, we begin sending notices: first to the school’s parents using text, email and voice messages. Next we alert all ECISD staff members of the situation, then we post messages to district Facebook and Twitter accounts and send to our local reporters. If the situation is one that takes time to resolve, we will send updates every 20-30 minutes to these sets of people. Once the situation is over, we send one final message,” Adkins said.
Last year a similar incident at PHS occurred where someone did actually have a gun.
“It happened on an afternoon when several people in the communication loop were out of town,” Adkins said. “We did not provide the appropriate communication in that situation and we made changes to our procedures to make sure we do not have that kind of mistake in the future.”
