Houston, Miami schools receive threat of violence, campuses to remain open

In New York, a similar email threat was sent.

By Tuesday afternoon, the threat had been dismissed as not credible. In the week after the massive terror attack in Paris, Brussels shut down for four days amid an ongoing manhunt for one suspect. “We will be sending patrol units pretty much around all the schools”, he said.

As the nation continues to calibrate its responses to the ongoing threat of terrorism, Tuesday was a dramatic case study in how hard every decision can be. His own son was caught up in a 3 1/2-hour lockdown at his Fairfield high school in October after a telephone threat.

“Schools weren’t named. The district itself wasn’t named”. Southern California has been through a lot in recent weeks.

LAUSD Superintendent Ramon Cortines said the San Bernardino attack that left 14 people dead influenced his decision to cancel classes.

Gonzalez-Diego said “additional resources” would be on campus Thursday, but emphasized “It will be a regular school day”.

“Based on past circumstance, I could not take the chance”, Cortines said.

Los Angeles canceled school Tuesday in light of the threat Tuesday, prompting some criticism in NY, from Bratton in particular, for “overreacting”.

The email threat sent to members of the Los Angeles school board that prompted a city-wide school closure was lengthy and sometimes rambling, a law enforcement source told CBS News senior investigative producer Pat Milton.

New York Mayor Bill de Blasio told a press conference that the threat was “so generic and outlandish” that it could not be taken seriously.

A spokesman for the New York Police Department said the emails to both LA and NY officials “Were the exact same with the exception of putting in the cities’ names and changing the number of people who were supposed to be participating in it”. Perhaps, even worldwide ones.

A United States official said investigators were looking for a possible bomb or bombs in connection with the Los Angeles closure. “And these are necessary, providing that it is indeed a credible threat – a law enforcement term, who must make the determination of what is credible”. They are pressure cooker bombs, hidden in backpacks around the schools. However, LAPD officials say they need to know more about the suspect before they are completely comfortable that the threat is false.

“And so from a psychological standpoint, that’s exactly what terrorism is: It’s to provoke fear so that your operations stop”, he says. “I want to reassure students, parents, guardians, teachers and other employees that our schools are safe”, LAUSD Chief Deputy Superintendent Michelle King said. “No longer was it something they just had to hear about on the news – now they had to scramble to make alternative arrangements for their kids”. Both Garcetti and Beck expressed strong support for the decision.

Parents in Los Angeles appeared to be divided over the district’s decision to close down schools, with many complaining over the lack of an alert system for such emergencies.

Bratton, who previously served as Los Angeles police chief from 2002 to 2009, said the person behind the threat may have been inspired by the hit television series “Homeland”.