Police say a teen in the town of Bridgewater, N.S., and a youth from Manitoba have been arrested for allegedly planning simultaneous attacks at their local schools.
The Bridgewater Police Service said it was alerted Friday by the international police agency Interpol and the FBI that a 15-year-old from the town and Manitoba youth had been talking online about their desire to mount a “violent attack” at Park View Education Centre and Rivers Collegiate.
Police arrested the Bridgewater teen on Tuesday.
A news release Wednesday said officers searched a residence and discovered handwritten plans, imitation weapons, including an imitation pipe bomb and assault rifle, and clothing with hate symbols and “concerning comments.” A cellphone and laptop were also taken by police.
A 14-year-old in Manitoba was arrested on Monday by local RCMP. Rivers Collegiate is located in the western Manitoba community of Rivers and has 141 students in grades 7-12.
“The plan was to go in and murder multiple students, and the type of weapon used in the murder wasn’t clearly laid out yet,” Danny MacPhee, Bridgewater’s deputy police chief, told CBC News on Wednesday.
Teens accused of planning Manitoba, N.S. school attacks arrested
MacPhee said the seized electronic devices are being sent for analysis to uncover potential connections.
MacPhee said the teens had been talking about an attack “for a period of time.” He said police found handwritten notes and “mapping made out of the school.”
“It was a handwritten map, and then basically handwritten notes of a plan [and] how they would proceed with an active attack,” MacPhee said.
He said he believes the youths communicated online through a mix of open chatting and private messaging, but that would be up to the investigators to verify.
MacPhee said it appeared the teens were planning simultaneous attacks at certain dates at both of their high schools, possibly in the next school year. He said so far, the teens appeared to only know each other online — not in real life.
“The plans were in the planning stages. They weren’t imminent, so we believe we’ve kind of hit this off before it escalated,” said MacPhee.
He said there’s no evidence indicating ties to specific groups or organizations, but the investigation is still in its early stages.
MacPhee credited the international police, the FBI and investigators in Manitoba for thwarting the attack.
“We do work a fair amount together. It’s not as common as our everyday file, but I think we all want to get a good outcome. And that’s why we get into policing, is to prevent a crime, not go to an after attack. So this is a big win for all agencies involved,” he said.
Park View Education Centre, operated by the South Shore Regional Centre for Education, is a public senior high school in Bridgewater that has about 900 students.
In a statement to CBC News on Wednesday, the regional education centre said it has scaled up student support and briefed staff on available resources.
The 15-year-old is scheduled to appear in Bridgewater youth court Wednesday on charges of conspiracy to commit murder and uttering threats to cause death.
Police are investigating the incident as a potential hate crime, and other charges could be laid.
Anyone with information related to the case is asked to contact Bridgewater police.
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