Willow Glen Resident

News

Gun at Leigh turns out to be a rumor

By Cathy Weselby

It was much ado about MySpace at Leigh High School this past week.

Rumors that someone was planning to come to school with a gun on March 12 spread like wildfire through MySpace and text messages between students the previous night.

Many concerned parents showed up at the school the next morning asking if it was safe for their children to attend school. Others kept their children home. The school reported more than half the student body absent that day.

Leigh High School principal Donna Hope assured parents that the rumor was unsubstantiated, but seven San Jose police officers remained on campus for the rest of the day as a precautionary measure, and squad cars patrolled the perimeter.

"We told parents, 'If this were real, school would not have opened," Hope said.

The rumors started when school officials discovered graffiti on the morning of March 10 that alluded to a fight planned for March 12. School officials snapped a picture of the message and sent it to the police before painting over the graffiti. Police confirmed that it didn't appear to be gang-related and was likely a hoax.

Hope said one of the deans went to the two classrooms nearest to the graffiti and reassured the students.

Late Tuesday night, rumors began to circulate through MySpace and text messaging, and the message escalated from a fight to someone planning to bring a gun to school.

"It was like an old-fashioned game of telephone on steroids," Hope said.

She said a responsible student called the dean on his cell phone that night and told him about the rumors.

Hope, district officials and police officers met early in the morning March 12.

"We had no idea how large the magnitude of the rumor," Hope said.

The school had 40 percent attendance on Wednesday.

Hope said that many students became anxious throughout the day and asked for permission to go home.

District director of student services and assessment Terry Peluso said that the school erred on the side of safety.

"We'd have to have a crystal ball to determine whether the rumors were being read by a lot of people and taken seriously," Peluso said.

He added that there isn't anything in the district's structure to deal with this issue and, "We can't monitor MySpace on a 24/7 basis."

"It's uncharted territory," Hope said. "Principals from all over the valley were calling me and asking, 'How did you deal with this?' because none of us have encountered this before."