No law enforcement action was deemed necessary after Effingham Unit#40 administrators were made aware of an alleged threat to Effingham High School over the weekend. Effingham County Sheriff’s Office Chief Deputy Paul Kuhns said that a School Resource Officer was “extensively” involved in an investigation into the alleged threat but found no danger to the school.
“Anytime there’s any kind of threat to the school, the school has certain protocol that’s put into place on how it’s handled,” Kuhns said. “They were investigated extensively yesterday [Monday] and no enforcement action was taken.”
Unit#40 Superintendent Mark Doan said the district was alerted to the alleged threat by law enforcement and informed parents Monday after school, via phone message, to prevent any rumors from being exasperated.
“The school was always safe, the kids were always safe,” Doan said on Tuesday. “Whenever we’re faced with these type of issues we work closely [with] and let the professionals take the lead and those professionals are our local sheriff’s department and local city police.”
Doan couldn’t comment of the source of alleged threat, but did say that he appreciated students alerting administration of information they heard on Monday. He said that such information, either in or out of school, is taken very seriously by the district. “If there was any doubt whatsoever we would have made a different decision,” Doan said.