By BARBARA GREEN
editor@bowienewsonline.com
Bowie police and school administrators have identified a 15-year-old male believed to have made a verbal remark threatening to shoot up the school.
The investigation, that began Tuesday, is ongoing and led the district to go into what police called “heightened awareness” throughout the week. An additional unconfirmed threat report came out Thursday night which lead to the cancellation of school on Friday. (See related story on 1A.)
Lead School Resource Officer Lt. Bob Blackburn said on Tuesday afternoon about 2:30 p.m. they were made aware of a rumor about a high school shooting the following Friday. The information came through the anonymous BOJO Tipline. No specific time or person were named.
Police and school officials began trying to identify witnesses who may have heard these comments.
Blackburn said initially discussion turned to graffiti on a desk that showed a crude carving of what appeared to be a gun, a swastika, some sort of beacon and the words “shoot school now.”
This drawing was looked into about six weeks ago according to police and the desk had not been in use, but appears to have been put back into service. Blackburn said this was not connected to this most recent rumor.
“After talking to several students we found there was one who said something to the effect the school is lucky I don’t have a gun because I would come shoot it up. The person who reportedly made the comment is identified as a 15-year-old male student,” said Blackburn.

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