1. Intermediate Unit 08 Altoona-Johnstown Friday, April 6, 2018
Threat Assessment: How to evaluate possible “at-risk” of violence students
Intermediate Unit 08 Altoona-Johnstown Friday, April 6, 2018

2. Quote to consider…
“The vast majority of the nation’s students will complete their schooling without ever being touched by peer violence. Nevertheless, recent school attacks carried out by students have shaken the image of schools as reliably safe and secure environments in which the qualifications of teachers and the efficacy of the educational curricula are the most pressing concerns of educators and parents. Televised images of frightened and injured students fleeing school grounds have imprinted themselves on the American consciousness.”

3. Quote to consider…
“However, highly publicized school shootings have created uncertainty about the safety and security of this country’s schools and generated fear that an attack might occur in any school, in any community. Increased national attention to the problem of school violence has prompted educators, law enforcement officials, mental health professionals, and parents to press for answers to two central questions: "Could we have known that these attacks were being planned?" and, if so, "What could we have done to prevent these attacks from occurring?"

4. Quotes that carry forward…
Quotes come in aftermath of Columbine (1990)
Quotes from:
Threat Assessment in Schools: A Guide to Managing Threatening Situations and to Creating Safe School Climates (2004)
Joint project work of US Secret Service and US Department of Education
Question, “Why are the quotes still relevant?”

5. Issue Defined
Hostile Based Action

6. Issue more than Active Shooter
Focus of prevention points to “shooter”
Shooting?
Murder, violence, and harms are at issue
Tool or means of violence less of focus
Goal is to prevent harm, any harm
More than shooting, any violence
Firearms are “effective” weapons, but not only weapons
IED and other weapons also threats

7. Issue more than “Schools”
Schools are profound psychological targets . . .
Impact of “Beltway Snipers” & Colorado Movie Shooting
School “Shooting” is Hostile Based Action event
Any location can be site of Hostile Based Action Event
Our focus school, or issues originating from schools

8. Issue more than “Active” Shooter
Hostile Based Actions are events
Hostile Based Actions, more than event
Important, Prevention Planning
Important, Mitigation Planning
Important, Response Planning
Important, Recovery Planning
Multi-Hazard Planning is Key!
Plan for Before, During, and After!

9. Issue more than “Profile”
Desire to find “Active Shooter Profile”
Profile is elusive and some say flawed
Profiles are response & trait based, reduce pot of suspects
Many people fit profiles, not good at preventing
Behavioral vs. Traits
We seek to find pathways of ideas and behaviors that prove risk of violence is probable

10. Issue more than “Profile”
Many people fit profiles, not all who fit act out
Focus on identifying “pathways to violence” within thinking and actions
“Has the subject engaged in recent behavior that suggests they are moving on a path toward violence?”
US Secret Service “Threat Assessment” Model
Threat Assessment in Schools: A Guide to Managing Threatening Situations and Creating Safe School Climates (2004)
RPP Training Aids Page

11. Training Document Sources

12. Session Objectives
Explore issue of Armed Intruder/Active Shooter/Hostile Based Actions in the K-12 school setting
Survey principles of “targeted violence”
Discuss process of “Behavioral Threat Assessment”
Survey process of evaluating possible at-risk students
Seek paths to prevent and/or mitigate student planned school violence

13. Core School Climate Goals
Attack pain, loneliness, desperation and despair.
Create climate of emotional fit and respect.
Create connections between adults and students.
Break student “code of silence.”
Develop and sustain safe school climates:
Capacity to pick up and evaluate indicators person at-risk
Employ risk evaluation to prevent possible attacks

14. School Threat Assessment
Methodology Explored
School Threat Assessment

15. 10-Key School Violence Study Findings
Rarely sudden impulsive acts.
Others had idea of actor’s thoughts or plan.
Did not make direct threat
No useful student profile
Displayed behavior of concern
Know loss, issues coping, considered or attempted suicide
Felt bullied & persecuted
Prior access to weapons
Involved other students
Attack stopped by other than by LE response
1. School-based attacks typically did not "just snap"
Example: One attacker asked his friends to help him get ammunition for one of his weapons; sawed off the end of a rifle to make it easier to conceal beneath his clothes; shopped for a long trench coat with his mother; and cut the pockets out of the coat so that he could conceal the weapon within the coat while holding it through one of the cut-out pockets. This same attacker had a well-known fascination with weapons and frequently told his friends that he thought about killing certain students at school.
2. Friends, schoolmates, and/or siblings–knew about the attacker’s idea or plan
Example: One attacker had planned to shoot students in the lobby of his school prior to the beginning of classes. He told two friends exactly what he had planned and asked three other students to meet him in the mezzanine overlooking the school lobby the morning of the planned attack, ostensibly so that these students would be out of harm’s way. On most mornings, few students would congregate in the mezzanine before the school day began. However, on the morning of the attack, word about what was going to happen spread to such an extent that, by the time the attacker opened fire in his school lobby, 24 students had gathered in the mezzanine waiting for the attack to begin. One student who knew about the attacker’s plans brought a camera so that he could take pictures of the event.
3. Did not threaten their targets directly
Most attackers did not threaten their target directly and some made no threat at all. Instead, other behaviors and communications that may prompt concern, such as hearing that a young person is talking about bringing a gun to school, are indicators of a possible threat and therefore should prompt the initiation of efforts to gather information.
4 No accurate or useful "profile"
Example: In one case, the dean of students had commended a student for improving his grades and behavior a few weeks before that student carried out an attack at his school.
5 Displayed behavior of concern
Young people send signals–both direct and indirect–to others regarding their problems. The actors who engaged in the targeted school were not "invisible" students. Nearly all engaged in behaviors that caused concern to at least one person, usually an adult–and most concerned at least three people.
6 Difficulty coping with significant losses or personal failures. Many had considered or attempted suicide
More than three-quarters of school shooters had a history of suicidal thoughts, threats, gestures, or attempts. Most of these students were known to have been severely depressed or desperate at some point before their attacks. A student is facing or having trouble dealing with a significantly difficult situation may indicate a need to refer the student to appropriate services and resources. Example: One school shooter submitted a series of poems describing his thoughts of suicide and homicide to his English teacher.
7 Many attackers felt bullied, persecuted, or injured by others
In a number of the incidents of targeted school violence studied, attackers described being bullied in terms that suggested that these experiences approached torment.
8 Most attackers had access to and had used weapons
Almost two-thirds of attackers used a handgun in their attack. Almost half used a rifle. Most attackers acquired weapons from their home or the home of a relative. Approximately two-thirds of attackers had a history of using guns prior to the attack
9 In many cases, other students were involved in the attack in some capacity
In over half of the incidents, others assisted in the planning or execution of the attack by actively encouraging the attacker to shoot others at school, or even helping to select targets and train the shooter in how to use a weapon.
10 Despite prompt law enforcement responses, most attacks were stopped by means other than law enforcement intervention and most were brief in duration.
The short duration of most incidents of targeted school violence argues for the importance of developing preventive measures in addition to any emergency planning for a school or school district.

16. 6 Principles in Threat Assessment Model
Attack is an outcome event, stemming from:
Process of thinking and behavior
Process that can be understood and is often discernible
Not “just snapped” event
The consider targets, talk about ideas, document ideas, seek out and practice with weapons; over days, weeks, months or years

17. 6 Principles in Threat Assessment Model
Person + Situation + Setting + Target = Attack
Violence stems from 4-part interaction
How is/has the at-risk person dealt with life?
What is the current life situation of at-risk person?
Is life setting pushing or pulling the person forward?
What is the scope of the target risk?

18. 6 Principles in Threat Assessment Model
A “right” mindset is need to ID & Prevent
The “investigative mindset” is critical
Skeptical: question everything to verify truth
Inquisitive: seeking to know more and more
Common sense: does this make sense?
Fact Focused: key points to possible pre-attack behavior.

19. 6 Principles in Threat Assessment Model
Effective assessment is all about facts
Not about characteristics or traits
Behavior based facts of person and situation
Motive + Intent + Ability = Many possible people
However, how “at-risk” is this student of concern?
Blanket “easy” profiles do not make an assessment

20. 6 Principles in Threat Assessment Model
Integrated systematic approach is needed
System of seeing, collecting, fitting pieces of possible puzzle.
Requires relationships with agencies and service systems.
Internal school and external community partnership needed.

21. 6 Principles in Threat Assessment Model
Q: Does this student poses a threat?
Much more than “made a threat”
<20% made a direct threat
80% no direct threat, but telegraphed risk
Focus on tapestry of behavior, not threat thread
But every threat needs prompt attention

22. School Threat Assessment
Methodology Initiated
School Threat Assessment

23. Steps to Employ Threat Assessments
Establish authority for school to conduct threat inquiry
Define process in formal public policy
Responsibility by roles: admin., staff, SRO, LE, etc.
Outline extent of behaviors that can trigger inquiry
Identify the types of information that may be gathered
Detail the people or group who will gather and assess
Outline steps of action from initiation to conclusion

24. Steps to Employ Threat Assessments
Establish capacity to conduct inquiries
Create multidisciplinary threat assessment team
Can be multi-purpose: suicide, special education, bulling prevention
Clearly define team roles and responsibilities
Carefully train team on threat assessment process
Who do you think should serve on such a team?
The multidisciplinary threat assessment team’s principal responsibility is to guide the assessment and management of situations of concern. A senior school administrator should chair the team. Regular members of the team ideally should include: 1) a respected member of the school faculty or administration; 2) an investigator, such as a school resource officer or other police officer assigned to the school; 3) a mental health professional, such as a forensic psychologist, a clinical psychologist, or a school psychologist; and 4) other professionals, such as guidance counselors, teachers, coaches, and others, who may be able to contribute to the threat assessment process.
In addition, the chair of the threat assessment team may wish to consider including as an ad hoc member of the team someone who knows the student of concern in the threat assessment inquiry. This ad hoc position might be held by an individual from the school community, such as a teacher, counselor, coach, nurse, other school employee, or someone from the community who may know or have knowledge of the student, such as a probation officer, member of the clergy, or a social service worker.
If the student of concern is being provided services under the Individuals with Disabilities in Education Act (IDEA), a representative from the team that developed or manages that student’s Individualized Education Plan (IEP) also should be brought onto the threat assessment team as an ad hoc member for the inquiry regarding this particular student.

25. Steps to Employ Threat Assessments
Establish an integrated relationship system
Build relationships inside and outside school:
Law Enforcement
Child Welfare
Juvenile Probation
Recreational Sports or Interest Groups
Find “bridge” people (boundary spanners)

26. School Threat Assessment
Methodology Employed
School Threat Assessment

27. Inquiry to Investigative - Movement
Detail process of conducing threat assessment
Inquiry vs Investigation
School inquires, passed to police to investigate…
Scope of inquiries/investigations vary
Assessment can be resolved when “done”
Found to be false, unfounded, not pose threat
If probable threat to school or community to police

28. Inquiry to Investigation - Explored
School inquiry and police investigation, same question:
Is there information to suggest that this student is on the path to an attack?
What is the risk of targeted violence?
School inquiry is based in school, SRO should help
If believe risk on path to attack, referred to police
Police investigation asks additional question:
Has the student violated the law or laws?
Would be useful to discuss the inchoate crimes of Criminal Attempt, Criminal Conspiracy, and Criminal Solicitation.
901. Criminal attempt.
(a) Definition of attempt.--A person commits an attempt when, with intent to commit a specific crime, he does any act which constitutes a substantial step toward the commission of that crime.
§ Criminal solicitation.
(a) Definition of solicitation.--A person is guilty of solicitation to commit a crime if with the intent of promoting or facilitating its commission he commands, encourages or requests another person to engage in specific conduct which would constitute such crime or an attempt to commit such crime or which would establish his complicity in its commission or attempted commission.
§ Criminal conspiracy.
(a) Definition of conspiracy.--A person is guilty of conspiracy with another person or persons to commit a crime if with the intent of promoting or facilitating its commission he:
(1) agrees with such other person or persons that they or one or more of them will engage in conduct which constitutes such crime or an attempt or solicitation to commit such crime; or
(2) agrees to aid such other person or persons in the planning or commission of such crime or of an attempt or solicitation to commit such crime.

29. Inquiry to Investigative - Scope
Not wholesale examination of student body
Process of responding to concerns for identified students
Students who have come to attention for possible concern
So do students become possible concern?
Behavior that troubles staff, students, or others
Report may be direct, indirect, or anonymous
Some students may bring themselves to the attention of authorities by engaging in communications that cause concern:
- A student submits a story for an English assignment about a character that shoots other students in his school.
- Two students in a video class make a movie about kids who bring bombs to school.
- A dean receives an stating, "I’m going to kill everyone in this asylum."
- A seventh-grader, who is known to be feared by his classmates, cocks a finger at another boy on the playground and says "you’re gonna die."
- The personal Web page of a high-achieving student has links to Web pages with information about cyanide.

30. Inquiry to Investigate – Reporting
Inquiry begins with report of concern
Need process of receiving reports
Policy and practice that lowers reporting barriers
Communicate what is of concern and how to report
Reinforce “everyone has a role”
Create central Point-of-Contact
Person and anonymous with receipt notice

31. Inquiry to Investigate - Initiation
What threshold of behavior starts inquiry
Team to define principle based threshold
What information should be sought in inquiry?
Document facts that drew attention to the student
Information about the student
Identity, background, & current life
Document attack related behaviors
Motives
Target selection
2. Information about the student
A. Identifying information:
- name;
- physical description;
- date of birth; and
- identification numbers (e.g., Social Security number, student ID, etc.).
B. Background information:
- residences;
- family/home situation;
- academic performance;
- social networks;
- history of relationships and conflicts;
- history of harassing others or of being harassed by others;
- history of violence toward self and others;
- history of having been a victim of violence or bullying;
- known attitudes toward violence;
- criminal behavior;
- mental health/substance abuse history;
- access to and use of weapons; and
- history of grievances and grudges.
C. Current life information:
- present stability of living and home situations;
- nature and quality of current relationships and personal support;
- recent losses or losses of status (shame, humiliation, recent breakup or loss of significant relationship);
- current grievances or grudges;
- perceptions of being treated unfairly;
- known difficulty coping with a stressful event;
- any "downward" progression in social, academic, behavioral, or psychological functioning;
3. Information about "attack-related" behaviors
Behaviors that should raise concern about potential violence include:
- ideas or plans about injuring him/herself or attacking a school or persons at school;
- communications or writings that suggest that the student has an unusual or worrisome interest in school attacks;
- comments that express or imply the student is considering mounting an attack at school;
- recent weapon-seeking behavior, especially if weapon-seeking is linked to ideas about attack or expressions about interest in attack;
- communications or writings suggesting the student condones or is considering violence to redress a grievance or solve a problem; and
- rehearsals of attacks or ambushes.
4. Motives
Motives for actual school attacks have included:
- revenge for a perceived injury or grievance;
- yearning for attention, recognition, or notoriety;
- a wish to solve a problem otherwise seen as unbearable; and
- a desire to die or be killed.
5. Target selection
Most school shooters identified their targets to friends and fellow students before advancing the attack. Almost half of school shooters had more than one target. Threat assessors should consider whether and how a potential attacker’s interest in a target may shift to another target over time. Information about a student’s targets may provide clues to the student’s motives, planning, and attack-related behaviors. Information about the student’s motives also may inform the question of whether there are additional targets.

32. Inquiry to Investigate - Information
Where to gather information?
School based information
Records, teacher interviews, other staff
Collateral school interviews
Students and adults who know student
Parents or guardian interview
Student of concern interview
Person target interview
1. School information
Answers to the following questions may be drawn from information at school:
Is the student well known to any adult at the school?
Has the student come to attention for any behavior of concern? If so, what? (e­mail, Web site, posters, papers, rule-breaking, violence, harassment, adjustment problems, depression or despair, acting-out behavior, etc.)
Has the student experienced serious difficulties or been in distress?
Is there anyone with whom the student shares worries, frustrations, and/or sorrows?
Is there information that the student has considered ending his or her life?
Has the student been a victim and/or an initiator of hostile, harassing, or bullying behavior directed toward other students, teachers, or other staff?
Is the student known to have an interest in weapons? If so, has he or she made efforts to acquire or use weapons?
Does the student live in a home in which there are weapons (whether or not the weapons are secured)?
2. Collateral school interviews
The focus of these interviews should be factual:
What was said? To whom?
What was written? To whom?
What was done?
When and where did this occur?
Who else observed this behavior?
Did the student say why he or she acted as they did?
4. Interviews with the student of concern
Issues that should be considered include:
If and when to notify parents/guardians of an interview;
Whether or when to invite parents/guardians to be present during an interview;
Whether and how to use information from an interview for criminal justice proceedings; and
Whether and when legal representation should be allowed, offered, or provided.

33. School Threat Assessment
Methodology Examined
School Threat Assessment

34. Inquiry to Investigate - Analyzed
How is threat risk information organized and evaluated?

35. Q1: What are the student’s motive(s) and goals?
What motivated the student to make the statements or take the actions that caused him or her to come to attention?
Does the situation or circumstance that led to these statements or actions still exist?
Does the student have a major grievance or grudge?
Against whom?
What efforts have been made to resolve the problem and what has been the result?
Does the potential attacker feel that any part of the problem is resolved or see any alternatives?

36. Q2: Have there been any communications suggesting ideas or intent to attack?
What, if anything, has the student communicated to someone else?
Targets, friends, other students, teachers, family, others)
Written in a diary, journal, or Web site concerning his or her ideas and/or intentions?
Have friends been alerted or "warned away"?

37. Q3: Has the subject shown inappropriate interests?
School attacks or attackers;
Weapons (including recent acquisition of any relevant weapon); or
Incidents of mass violence (terrorism, workplace violence, mass murderers).
Joined any violent groups?
Seek to find peers who “validate” their thinking
Moved away from people who pull them back

38. Q4: Has the student engaged in attack-related behaviors?
Developing an attack idea or plan;
Making efforts to acquire or practice with weapons;
Casing, or checking out, possible sites and areas for attack; or
Rehearsing attacks or ambushes.

39. Q5: Does the student have the capacity to carry out an act of targeted violence?
How organized is the student’s thinking and behavior?
Does the student have the means, access to a weapon, to carry out an attack?

40. Q6: Is the student experiencing hopelessness, desperation, despair, major life loss?
Is student is experiencing desperation and/or despair?
Experienced a recent failure, loss and/or loss of status?
Known to be having difficulty coping with a stressful event?
Is the student now, or has the student ever been, suicidal or "accident-prone"?
Behavior suggests considered ending life?
History of mental illness with substance abuse?

41. Q7: Does the student have a trusting relationship with at least one responsible adult?
Does the student have at least one relationship with an adult where the student feels that he or she can confide in the adult and believes that the adult will listen without judging or jumping to conclusions?
Students with trusting relationships with adults may be directed away from violence and despair and toward hope.
Is the student emotionally connected to–or disconnected from–other students?
Has the student previously come to someone’s attention or raised concern in a way that suggested he or she needs intervention or supportive services?

42. Q8: Does the student see violence as an acceptable, or desirable, or the only, way to solve problems?
Does the setting around the student (friends, fellow students, parents, teachers, adults) explicitly or implicitly support or endorse violence as a way of resolving problems or disputes?
Has the student been "dared" by others to engage in an act of violence?

43. Q9: Is the student’s conversation and "story" consistent with his or her actions?
Does information from collateral interviews and from the student’s own behavior confirm or dispute what the student says is going on?

44. Q10: Are other people concerned about the student’s potential for violence?
Are those who know the student concerned that he or she might take action based on violent ideas or plans?
Are those who know the student concerned about a specific target?
Have those who know the student witnessed recent changes or escalations in mood and behavior?

45. Q11: What circumstances might affect the likelihood of an attack?
What factors in the student’s life and/or environment might increase or decrease the likelihood that the student will attempt to mount an attack at school?
What is the response of other persons who know about the student’s ideas or plan to mount an attack?
Do those who know about the student’s ideas actively discourage the student from acting violently, encourage the student to attack, deny the possibility of violence, passively collude with an attack, etc.?

46. Question Outcome Paths
“Is student’s path toward targeted violence?”
Weigh of information convincing does not pose a threat
Conclude threat assessment inquiry
If student, “target,” or school need help coping, seek support paths
Are convinced does pose a threat
Report matter to police
Take internal protective actions – but what actions?
Brainstorm possible internal school protective actions.

47. School Threat Assessment
Methodology Managed
School Threat Assessment

48. Indicated, now investigating, “What Now?”
Issue to police to investigate, are we to just wait?
No, develop Individual Management/Monitoring Plan
Who should manage/monitor?
Jurisdiction of juvenile or criminal justice, justice or courts
If not, school with parents
What about suspension, possible (pros/cons)?

49. Functional areas of threat management
Control or containment to prevent possible attack
Protecting and aiding possible targets
Providing support to help student deal with problems

50. Short Term Threat Management
Move immediately to intervene
Seek to contain situation to prevent violence
Act of the inquiry can have restraining effect
Provide help and support to address problem
May need to supervise and confine
Student of concern
Protect possible (focused) targets

51. Long Term Threat Management
What steps are needed to contain over long term?
What is needed to deter student from future violence?
What will be most effective and least damaging path?
Most familiar path may not be best…
Suspension or expulsion what if it becomes trigger
Path of punitive power, less prevention power?
Confinement, weapons removal, intervention, commitment

52. Intervene to inspire value and hope
Seeing to use violence to solve personal pain
Need to see there could be another, better path
Need to see they can have a future
Need to learn non-violent ways to cope
Need a integrated system showing student value
Need belief that they can “fit” – have place & purpose
Goal enable student to function without monitoring

53. School Threat Assessment
Methodology Maintained
School Threat Assessment

54. Creating a Connected School Climate
Assess school’s emotional climate
Active surveying, students, staff, and stakeholders
Emphasize the importance of listening
360˚ - up, down, left, right
Strong caring stance against code of silence
Sharing is caring, not snitching
Battle bullying

55. Creating a Connected School Climate
Empower students in crafting connected climate
Each student feels trust with one staff member
Maintain mechanism to sustain safe school climate
The safer things look the safer we feel
Include many hands to build personal ownership
See as “local” and “long term” – building community climate

56. Short List Steps to Stride
Seek School Board approval to create team policy
District creates a planning team to outline process
Planning team outlines policies and processes needed
Seek internal and external stakeholder feedback
School Board reviews and ratifies program details
District will implement threat assessment process

57. School Threat Assessment
Methodology To-Be Employed?
School Threat Assessment

58. Cautions of “Threat Assessment”
Profiles are flawed, people are complex
Events of profound violence are rare & hard to predict
No perfect tool to help prevent and protect
More than Threat Assessment system needed
Openness
Training
Planning
Exercising
Hardening

59. How Report Friendly is Your School?
School climate directs tips
People care
Taken seriously
Kept confidential
Staff need to know the indicators
School needs polices on reporting and assessing
Staff/Administrators need to be trained in how to:
Take, respond, and report “concerns”

60. How well Trained is Your School?
DHS Active Shooter Preparedness
IS-907 FEMA Active Shooter Training
Houston “Run, Hide, Fight” Video
Local Link

61. How well Planned is Your School?
School Multi-Hazards Plan?
Continuity of Operations Plan?
Family Reunification Plan?
Mass Casualty Plan?

62. How well Exercised is Your School?
School leads are encouraged to work with their local Police to conduct active-shooter HSEEP:
Seminars – review plans/policies
Workshops – build draft plan, policy, MOU
Tabletop Exercise – simulated scenarios
Drill – lock down/out, evacuation, etc.
Functional Exercise - validates coordination, command, and control between various multi-agency coordination centers (EOC)

63. How well Hardened is Your School?
Lack of means to securely “vet” visitors
Open “access control” to open areas
Leaving exterior doors propped open
Not securing room doors
Not requiring staff to display photo identification cards
Lack of “all-hazard” emergency plans
Not conducing regular lock-down/out hostile action drills

64. How about site and plan assessment?
Conduct assessment of school(s)
Possible risk, all the more if no action
Reports are confidential
PSP assessment is without charge
RPP assessment costing available on request
Detailed report of action recommendations

65. Site Assessment Areas of Review
Perimeter fence
Vehicle Control
Parking
Vegetation
Loading Docks
Trash Receptacles
Lighting
Windows
HVAC Systems
Utilities, Fuel Storage, Hazmat
Emergency Power
Closed Circuit Television Systems
Access Controls
Locks/Electronic Control Devices
Intrusion Detection
Security Personnel
Policies, Plans, Procedures

66. Questions?

67. Contact Information
Garret Rain
PSP RVAT