13-Year-Old Boy Arrested After Threatening to Shoot up School With AK-47

A 13-year-old boy in Missouri was arrested on Sunday after making a video threatening to shoot up a school with an AK-47.

The teenager was arrested in his home in Republic, Missouri in the early hours of the morning. Police told DailyMail that he’d sent a video to a friend on Friday evening, in which he threatened to commit a mass shooting.

The threat was reported to authorities on Saturday evening. Officers quickly obtained a warrant and entered the boy’s home at 2:37 a.m. the next morning. The teenager was arrested and transported to Greene County Juvenile Detention Center.

Very few other details were provided about the case. Police wouldn’t specify which social media platform the video was sent on, nor whether it was visible to the public or just the recipient. They also noted that the threat didn’t target a specific school.

Police said they seized guns and other evidence during their search of the home, though they wouldn’t say whether or not they’d found an AK-47. The gun is illegal in all 50 states, though some semi-automatic versions are available.

The boy was a student at Republic Middle School according to a report by the Springfield News-Ledger.

The arrest comes only four days after Nikolas Cruz used an AR-15 assault rifle to attack his former high school in Parkland, Florida on Wednesday. The massacre left 17 people dead. Cruz was taken alive, which is uncommon in mass shooting cases. He’s facing 17 charges of premeditated murder.

Cruz had also advertised his small arsenal of weapons and proclivity for violence on social media before the attack. Some of his comments online had been reported to the FBI, and other students said it was well known that he was capable of such a stunt. The nation is reeling as it tries to determine who should be held accountable for missing Cruz’s warning signs.

Classes in Republic weren’t disturbed on Monday, though the staff reportedly met early in the morning to discuss how they could support students and make sure that any threats were reported early.

“We will help students process this situation and continue to reiterate the message that we must all work together to keep our schools safe,” read a statement from the school district.

“It is important for students and parents to immediately report threats like this to law enforcement so a proper investigation can be conducted,” the statement continued.