A 16-year-old student was arrested with a gun found in his backpack just two hours after he threatened on social media to shoot up his Queens high school, Mayor Adams announced Thursday.
The arrest — which took place after the Federal Bureau of Investigation alerted the NYPD about the student’s disturbing social media post — was touted by officials as an example of technology and law enforcement working together.
“Our heroic officers did an excellent job of immediately responding to the scene, working with the school staff and school safety agents to investigate the tip, find the student and recover the gun,” Adams said at a press conference. “We’re so grateful that this incident did not end tragically, I don’t want to imagine the world where we would be making a different announcement right now.”
The student, a 10th grader at Benjamin N. Cardozo High School in Bayside, posted on Instagram at 10:17 a.m. a picture of what looked like a school worksheet with the caption “Ts Gmt boutta shoot the school up” — using an acronym Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch said means, “this s**t gets me tight.”
The FBI’s National Threat Operation Center swiftly detected the post and alerted the NYPD, along with the social media account holder’s username, phone number, date of birth and the location where they posted from — which was traced to the school campus. Less than 15 minutes later, officers from the 111st Precinct responded to the school, where the student was removed from class without incident.
When authorities searched the student’s backpack, they found a black, 9-millimeter Taurus GX4 semiautomatic handgun, Tisch said.
“As a mother of two young school-aged boys, I am shaken,” Tisch said at the press conference. “But as your police commissioner, I am resolute in ensuring that the NYPD does everything in our power to keep our children safe.
“While this incident is terrifying, it is an example of the law enforcement apparatus at the federal and local levels doing everything right. It is literally the system, our protocols, our training and our processes working just as they should,” Tisch said.
The gun was loaded with 13 rounds of bullets, Tisch said.
The student— whose identity was not released because he is a minor — does not have a criminal record. He was arrested by police at 12:36 p.m. — approximately two hours after making the threatening post.
“I also want to mention another life saved today,” Adams said at the news conference. “If that 16-year-old had carried out this act, he either would have ended up dead or in jail for many years… This was a failure of a society that allowed a 16-year-old to get so close to shooting up a school and potentially killing classmates and teachers.”
