Students ran in panic at a Los Angeles school campus Monday after a teen armed with a knife confronted another student in a frightening midday incident.
The confrontation unfolded around 12:30 p.m. on the shared campus of Westchester Enriched Sciences Magnets high school and WISH Academy charter school. Video from the scene shows a teenage boy carrying what witnesses described as a “big knife” as he entered the campus quad.
A second teen approached the armed student and confronted him. Moments later, the teen with the knife punched the other boy and chased him, prompting screams as several students scattered from the area.
Students who witnessed the chaos described a terrifying scene. “It was a big knife,” student Kaylin Lewis told KTLA. “When the knife was pulled out, I just ran away. The whole thing was surreal.”
Another student said rumors quickly spread about what may have led to the confrontation. “We heard it was rivalry gangs, but we’re not really sure what happened,” Kaylani Bates told KTLA. “There were a lot of people chasing him.”
School officials said a shelter-in-place order was issued while the knife-wielding teen was still on campus. Officers with the Los Angeles School Police Department responded quickly and took a student into custody.
The incident left some parents furious, with several saying they did not receive timely notification about the emergency. One parent raised concerns that a child may have been locked in a hallway during the lockdown, possibly near the armed student.
“To have a child locked in a hallway by himself, unable to get into a classroom because it’s a lockdown and you can’t reopen the door? That’s insane because anything could’ve happened to that kid in the hallway,” the parent told KTLA.
“People on the field, same thing. This guy with the knife could’ve been chasing after all of them. To not know what’s going on and to have your son or daughter call you before the school does, it’s really scary to know he had to go through that alone.”
The boy who was attacked suffered a minor cut, school officials said. The Los Angeles Unified School District said: “Students and staff are safe, no one was injured, and there is no ongoing threat to our campus. Instruction has resumed as normal.
“Out of an abundance of caution, the Los Angeles School Police Department will provide additional patrols around our campus.
Please know that we take any incident involving student safety extremely seriously. The safety and well-being of our students and staff remain our highest priority, and we will continue to work closely with law enforcement and District personnel to maintain a safe learning environment.”
