On 6th Anniversary of Sandy Hook, a Nerve-Wracking Morning

Sandy Hook Elementary students sent home after bomb threat called in; it appears it was a hoax
By Jenn Gidman,  Newser Staff
Posted Dec 14, 2018 12:08 PM CST
Sandy Hook School Evacuated on 6th Anniversary of Shooting
In this July 29, 2016, file photo, people attend an open house at the new Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., built to replace the one that was demolished after 20 first-graders and six educators were shot and killed there on Dec. 14, 2012.   (AP Photo/Mark Lennihan, File)

The sixth anniversary of the Sandy Hook shooting is a hard-enough day for the community of Newtown, Conn.—and it was made worse Friday morning by a bomb threat that forced Sandy Hook Elementary School to be evacuated. The Newtown Police Department says it was on the receiving end of a 9am call that claimed a bomb had been placed at the school; officers were sent over to check things out, and they deemed the threat not credible, NBC News reports. Still, as a precaution, students were sent home for the day. The school is not the same building where the Dec. 14, 2012, massacre that took the lives of 20 students and six educators happened (that building was razed), but it was built on the same site, per the AP.

"My heart is breaking," Connecticut Sen. Chris Murphy posted on Twitter in response to Friday's news out of a town that police say has an already "heightened anxiety" on the shooting's anniversary. "It's not unexpected that these anniversary dates bring out the evil in some people," a Newtown officer says, per WRAL. The AP notes it's not clear if this threat was related to the email hoax that shut down schools and other venues nationwide Thursday. Meanwhile, per WSHU, Sandy Hook Promise, an advocacy group created after the shooting, released a chilling PSA video this week promoting the group's "Know the Signs" program by showing a school day as experienced through the eyes of a soon-to-be shooter. (More Sandy Hook stories.)

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