An unfounded report of men carrying guns and knives near a North County school Friday prompted a roughly 90-minute campus lockdown.
A youngster at Joli Ann Leichtag Elementary School in Vista told a staff member about seeing two suspicious men in the neighborhood while walking to school at about 7:30 a.m., according to the San Diego County Sheriff’s Office.
Administrators at the campus, in the 600 block of Poinsettia Avenue, responded by notifying law enforcement and securing students and staffers in their classrooms and offices, “out of an abundance of caution,” the Sheriff’s office said.
Deputies immediately searched the area for the alleged armed men while seeking additional information from the student who made the initial report. They also interviewed other children who were with the student at the time.
Deputies then “determined that there was not a credible threat to the school” and concluded, based upon witness accounts, “that at no point were any individuals armed with a gun or other weapon near the school,” officials said.
Authorities ended the lockdown shortly before 9 a.m.
