PULASKI COUNTY, Ark. — A school shooting threat made to Mills Middle School on Thursday morning sent staff, students, and parents scrambling— since it happened the Pulaski County Sheriff's Office has been looking into who is responsible for the chaos.
Emotions are still high across the country since the deadly school shooting in Nashville happened less than a week ago.
It's a scare no one wants to hear.
The school day at Mills Middle School ended abruptly, and parents were reunited with their kids as classes dismissed at 1:00 p.m. that afternoon.
Though no guns or weapons were found inside, the threat of a school shooting is never something you want to hear about.
Executive Director of Communications for the Pulaski County Special School District, Jessica Duff, told us that the first call came into Mills Middle around 9:30 a.m.
"There was a threat made against the school in general. [The call] said that someone was going to come to the school within the hour," Duff explained.
Mills' school resource officer called the Pulaski County Sheriff's Department around this time
Almost an hour later, at 10:12 a.m., Duff said the same person called and requested to speak to the person who originally took the call.
The caller hung up the phone and a minute later at 10:13 a.m., the same person called and made the same threat that they were heading to Mills Middle School.
"At 10:20 a.m., is when we put Mills Middle on lockdown, and within five minutes, we put Mills High on lockdown," Duff said.
She added the high school was placed on lockdown since both campuses are so close to each other.
Around 12:15 p.m., PCSSD leaders made the decision to dismiss the middle school at 1:00 p.m.
"Law enforcement feels that in order to facilitate the investigation, they need to have the school empty so they can continue to do their investigation," Duff explained.
Deputies checked students as they left the building to go home, and they also stayed on campus for much of the day as they searched for any possible weapons or clues.
Though we did hear about a lot of rumors, PCSSD told us there was never a threat inside either building.
Classes at Mills Middle will resume on Friday, March 30 with added officers on campus, per PCSSD.