EAST PROVIDENCE — East Providence Police, with the cooperation of the School Department, continue to investigate an incident involving allegedly threatening emails directed towards the high school and sending dozens in the building to shelter in place for some 90 minutes last Friday, June 10.

Superintendent Kathryn Crowley updated the School Committee on the matter at the Tuesday, June 14, meeting of the body.

Crowley told the committee all of the safety procedures and protocols implemented by the district in consultation with the police department were specifically adhered to during the situation.

The superintendent noted districts are required to submit comprehensive safety plans for all of its buildings annually to the Rhode Island Department of Education for approval by the state authority. Those plans are approved by the School Committee in executive session, where the specifics are sealed as to prevent the details becoming public.

“We all worked very well collaboratively together,” Crowley told the committee.

The high school was the subject of concerning and potentially threatening emails allegedly sent from a former student received around mid-morning, approximately 11 a.m., on June 10. Those inside the building were immediately ordered to “shelter in place.”

One fortunate aspect of the situation, specifically that day, was that a vast majority of students and staff were not in attendance. The incident took place on the last day of final exams week for the 2021-22 term, which was previously scheduled as just a half-day. Only about 50 people were estimated to be in the high school at the time, making it a bit easier to inform and secure those potentially in harm’s way.

Upon inspection and initial observation by law enforcement, the shelter in place command was rescinded some 90 minutes after it was instituted or about 12:30 p.m. when the occupants were allowed to disperse.

Crowley credited the response of the EPPD led by Chief Chris Francesconi as well as the assistance during the situation of the district’s interim director of Information Technology Alfred Villeneuve for helping to diffuse the matter in relatively prompt fashion.

School Committee chair Joel Monteiro, who holds a similar role on the new EPHS Building Committee, observed a number of the security measures included in the project helped both school administrators and police assess the situation in real time.

He also acknowledged the City Council for unanimously supporting a resolution on the hiring of a school security specialist sponsored by Ward 3 rep Nate Cahoon, a former School Committee member and new EPHS Building Committee co-chair.

According to Cahoon’s submission, the city/district would initiate a Request for Proposals to hire “an independent consultant with expertise in policy, school security, and municipal finance to provide the City’s decision-makers with actionable recommendations to ensure the safety of our most precious asset — our children.”

As highlighted in the resolution, the incident here came only a few weeks after the latest mass murder of 21 students and staff at the Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, and nearly 10 years since the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre in next door Connecticut.

In light of the recent tragic events nationally, the Buffalo supermarket shooting deaths of 10 people still fresh on the mind, the Rhode Island General Assembly passed a series of gun-control measures during the final weeks of the 2022 session, including a ban large-capacity magazines (bullet holders) sponsored in the State Senate by Cynthia Coyne (D-Dist. 32, Barrington, Bristol, East Providence).

The legislation (2022-H 6614A, 2022-S 2653) prohibits the possession, sale or transfer of any feeding device capable of holding, or readily able to be extended to hold, more than 10 rounds of ammunition to be fed continuously into a semi-automatic firearm.

In addition, those who already own large-capacity magazines or weapons that hold more than 10 rounds will have 180 days to comply with the law by either permanently altering the weapon so it can no longer hold more than 10 rounds, turning it into their local or state police, or transferring or selling it to a federally licensed firearm dealer or person or outside the state who is lawfully entitled to own or possess it. The bill provides exceptions for current and retired law enforcement officers and active duty military or National Guard members.