Swatting incident at San Marcos High School linked to out-of-state caller

SAN MARCOS, Texas — San Marcos police said a fake threat from an out-of-state gunman prompted a major police response to the high school on Tuesday for an increasingly common crime known as “swatting.”

Swatting is such a widespread problem that the FBI even maintains a national database to track the crime. In fact, Austin High School in Austin ISD was confronted with a swatting incident on Wednesday morning. Investigators later determined that the call came from Florida and there was no threat to students or staff.

Heather Arenas, mother of a San Marcos CISD student, says she was ready to rush to San Marcos High School on Tuesday to get her 17-year-old son to safety.

“My children should be safe and happy at school. And just knowing that he is just scared makes me sad,” Arenas said.

San Marcos police were on the scene within three minutes of receiving the call.

“Contact teams flooded the buildings and began systematically searching them. More than 50 officers searched the building,” said Police Chief Stan Standridge. “The people seen outside were emergency responders.” [[2:33/2]]

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But Chief Standridge says no credible threats or injuries were identified. It turned out to be a hoax linked to an out-of-state number believed to be involved in at least two similar hoaxes across the country, a crime known as “swatting.”

“Swatting is ultimately an intolerable response from a law enforcement agency. And that's exactly what happened,” said Police Chief Standridge. “All other 911 calls stopped throughout the city.” [[12:45/2]]

Dr. Michael Cardona, superintendent of San Marcos CISD, says this not only disrupts classes, but also endangers students' mental and emotional well-being.

“The superintendent is very afraid, and for him, it impacts the entire system,” Dr. Cardona said. “We just recovered from COVID, which we couldn't control, but then we have this problem that we don't necessarily control.”

Arenas says her son didn't even want to go to school after Wednesday's incident.

“He's worried and doesn't pay attention in school,” said Arenas. “He was like that today too, he said I just couldn't concentrate. Because he just freaked out about it.”

For them, this so-called prank is no reason to laugh.

“I was pretty upset, you know, that the kids think this is funny and they're panicking their parents – and panicking the kids too,” Arenas said.

Chief Standridge isn’t laughing either.

“At the state level, this is a crime. At the federal level, you face five years in prison,” said Police Chief Standridge. “So from a law enforcement perspective, this is not a prank.”

Given the increasing frequency of such pranks throughout Central Texas, Arenas wants to urge everyone to stop and think about the consequences.

“They're playing on people's emotions and wasting the city's time,” Arenas said. “All the firefighters, all the police officers … it's just not funny and it's not worth it.”

To be clear, the caller has not yet been identified, but San Marcos police are confident an arrest will be made.

Two high school students also reported seeing a gun, but those reports were not related to the hoax. An investigation is currently underway to determine if they will face any punishment from the school or law enforcement.