Florida fifth grader arrested, charged with threatening a mass shooting, police say

A fifth grade student in Florida was arrested over the weekend and charged with sending a textual content message threatening to hold out a mass shooting, authorities stated.

In a press release Saturday, the Lee County Sheriff’s Office said it had discovered earlier that day of a "threatening textual content message" sent by a student at an elementary faculty.

It mentioned its local faculty risk enforcement staff was instantly notified and started investigating. The 10-year-old boy was interviewed and charged later with "making a written threat to conduct a mass shooting," the sheriff's workplace mentioned.

In video shared by authorities, the boy will be seen being led right into a police car.

“This scholar’s habits is sickening, particularly after the recent tragedy in Uvalde, Texas,” Lee County Sheriff Carmine Marceno stated in an announcement, noting that the menace got here simply days after the lethal school capturing at Robb Elementary Faculty left 19 college students and two academics dead.

“Proper now is just not the time to act like somewhat delinquent. It’s not funny,” he mentioned. “This little one made a pretend menace, and now he’s experiencing real penalties.”

Marceno mentioned his workforce “didn’t hesitate one second...NOT ONE SECOND,” to investigate the incident.

The comment got here as authorities in Uvalde face mounting criticism over their response to the Could 24 school shooting after it got here to light that they waited roughly an hour for backup as a substitute of immediately moving in on the gunman.

Chantal Da Silva is a breaking information editor for NBC News Digital based mostly in London.