LAKE COUNTY, Fla. – Some students at Lake Minneola High School have been afraid to return to class after their names were found on a classmate’s “kill list” last week.
According to a report from the Lake County Sheriff’s Office, a school resource officer on Thursday was asked to speak to the parents of a student who had a journal with the statement of ‘I will kill,’ along with a list of students' and teachers' names.
With permission from their parents, News 6 spoke to Ella and Mason, two seniors at Lake Minneola High School whose names were on the list.
“It’s just really nerve-wracking when the doorbell rings, when somebody knocks on the door. We don’t know who it is,” Mason said. “The past two days, I haven’t been to school. I’ve been having trouble sleeping and I haven’t had the energy to get up and go.”
“None of us have been to school these last few days,” Ella said.
In the report, the deputy said the student who wrote the list said they were not threats to kill and that they were just names of people who have bulled them. The report goes on to say that the student told the deputy they would never hurt someone.
However, Shannon, whose son Landon was on the list, denies the claim that her kid, or any other kid on the list, are bullies.
“These kids are not bullies,” Shannon said. “I can really only speak for Landon — not all of them. But I know Landon has just been racking his brain over the last few days about what he could have done to trigger him to have him be so upset that he wrote his name on this list.”
Initially, some of the kids who were on the list and their parents said they wish the school had handled the situation differently. But Shannon said since things have escalated, things have changed.
“They’re saying he’s not coming back to school; they’re going to offer them some mental health services and things like that now, but none of that was being offered until we got you all involved and all of this started to happen,” Shannon said.
We reached out to Lake County Schools, which said in a statement: “We conducted a behavioral threat assessment in this case as required by statute and we notified law enforcement. The student is facing consequences. The specifics of those consequences are part of the student record and by statute cannot be made public. But the student is not on campus today and has been alternatively placed.”
A spokesperson for the district also said: “I understand that one of our Mental Health Liaisons met with students and encouraged them to reach out to the guidance counselors if they needed additional support. Counselors were out for training part of last week so it’s possible some may have been late getting the information about the incident.”
The Lake County Sheriff’s Office told us the deputy who interviewed the student determined they had multiple cognitive and developmental disabilities. They said no arrest was made because it was determined the student lacked criminal intent and the ability to fully understand the gravity of the situation.