Austin ISD administrator calls for investigation into police response to LBJ’s false alarm

AUSTIN, TEXAS (KXAN) – An administrator of the Austin Independent School District has asked the district to investigate law enforcement’s response to campus 911 calls following an incident on the campus of the LBJ Early College.
A hoax spurred a large police presence ready to face an “active attack” at LBJ Early College High School on September 13.
The school was filled with officers who surrounded the building. The response put a lot of people on edge for something Trustee Kevin Foster called a false alarm.
“About 100 first responders, about 100 first responders arrived on the scene,” said Kevin Foster, of the Austin ISD school board.
There was a swarm of activity from Austin and the district police, EMS, fire department, and the Department of Public Safety.
Foster told the Austin ISD School Board at its last district meeting that officers lined up students in a classroom where they suspected the threat was coming from and removed them for questioning.
“When the students are afraid of the officers, when the students see guns drawn, when the students are withdrawn, it has an impact,” Foster said.
Foster has made it clear that he supports law enforcement, but said he wants AISD to take the lead in responses rather than agents who are not trained to deal with students.
“I want to understand why we can’t develop protocols in the age of TikTok challenges and crushes, and those cases that at some point are predictable,” Foster said.
Others say prevention is better than cure.
“That’s what we’re trained for, in the worst case scenario. We are grateful that no one was injured, ”said AISD Police Chief Ashley Gonzales. “We are so grateful that no one was hurt. We take these reports very seriously and the investigation is continuing.
So far, KXAN has been able to confirm that 14 Austin Fire units and 23 ATX EMS units have responded. Austin Police and DPS did not respond to KXAN’s request.
Austin ISD confirmed on Friday that they are conducting an after action review of the incident at LBJ.
Over the past six weeks, 10 different schools have been placed under “secure” or “on hold” status for nearly a dozen reasons.
Five of them concerned reports of violence, or a suspect with a weapon in an area near the school. Four were reports of someone with a gun on campus, but no guns were located in any of these incidents. Two concerned bomb threats.