March 27, 2001

As students at Granite Hills High School returned to class yesterday for the first time since last week's school shooting, police investigated reports of threatened violence at two other area high schools.

In separate incidents, authorities arrested a male student at Point Loma High School, who allegedly threatened to shoot a female classmate, and apprehended a boy at El Camino High School in Oceanside, who police said discussed a shootout on campus and was found to have a knife.

At Point Loma, rumors surfaced Saturday that an 11th-grader at the school planned to shoot a girl who had spurned his advances, students said. Those rumors quickly grew to include all girls who had rejected him.

San Diego police officers started investigating the rumors Saturday, said Point Loma High School Principal Michael Price.

When the boy arrived on campus with his parents in an unrelated matter yesterday morning, police officers confronted him. He was handcuffed and questioned while his locker was searched. No gun was found, said police spokesman Bill Robinson.

However, the teen-ager was arrested on suspicion of making terrorist threats, Robinson said. He was taken to Juvenile Hall.

"There were grounds to believe he may have had intentions to do it," Price said.

Meanwhile, in Oceanside, police arrested a 16-year-old El Camino High School student near campus Friday afternoon after authorities heard rumors that the boy was planning to shoot students. The boy recently was suspended from school, said Oceanside police spokeswoman Karen McDonough. An Oceanside police officer assigned to the school heard the rumors and alerted other officers.

Police found the boy near the campus, searched him and found the knife in his pocket, McDonough said. The boy was arrested on suspicion of possessing a concealed weapon and booked into Juvenile Hall.

"Nobody was hurt, fortunately," Robinson said. "But this is not a time to be making threats against anybody at any schools."

Price sent a letter home to Point Loma parents yesterday. In the one-page letter, he assured them that their children are safe and informed them of a meeting for parents at 7 p.m. tomorrow and an assembly for students Thursday.

"It disturbs me," Price said. "The sanctity of the school grounds used to be hallowed ground. Unfortunately, it's no longer that way."

Angelica Ramos, a freshman at Point Loma, said many of her friends left school after the threats.

"It's so scary," she said. "You shouldn't be scared to go to school."