Wall Township Schools Set Meeting To Address Security

The Wall Township School district late Wednesday morning announced plans to hold a community-wide meeting to discuss security concerns following reports that a former student planned an attack on his classmates.

The meeting is scheduled for 7 p.m. on Sept. 16 in the Wall High School gym, according to a release posted on the district website.

Wednesday's release follows an emergency, closed-door session of the Board of Education, held Tuesday morning.

That meeting, according to the letter, was in preparation for Monday's community session and involved Wall Police Chief Robert Brice, Lt. John Brockriede and Township Administrator Jeffrey Bertrand. 

"The Board of Education understands the importance of school safety and security," according to the unsigned release. "While the recent reported event is serious in nature, the board has been assured by law enforcement that no read [sic] danger ever existed." 

The release boasts of 28 new security measures submitted for state funding approval as part of its long-range security plan. The measures, approved by the board last month, are not expected to be approved by the state until the end of the year, the release says.

"Recognizing the significant time delay in getting these projects underway, the Board has decided to expedite other security measures in the interim," the release says. It is not more specific, but says a vote on those measures is expected at the school board's Sept. 17 meeting. 

No agenda for that meeting was posted Wednesday.

"The Board and the administration recognize that the report of the threat alone has had a dramatic effect on the community," the release says. "The safety of the students and staff is of the utmost importance to the Board of Education." 

Following the original report on Monday that a fifth grade student who, while enrolled at Central School in April, plotted a mass casualty event on at least 40 classmates and others, the school district and the Wall Township Police Department made public statements claiming the report had "many inaccuracies.''

The original report -- based on interviews with police Lt. John Brockriede and a letter from interim schools Superintendent Stephanie Bilenker -- said that the former student targeted Central School for violence based on a line in Bilenker's letter which reads: "At the end of the previous school year, law enforcement was notified of threats that a fifth grade Central School student made toward classmates."

The threat, Wall Patch later learned from Brockriede, was on Intermediate School students, not Central School students, since the new school year had begun, promoting those pupils. The information was updated with the correct school.

Bilenker was contacted prior to publication of the original report. The phone call was not returned. 

Brockriede, who was interviewed by Wall Patch on two separate occasions Monday morning prior to publication of the original report, said the event planned was similar to a "Columbine'' and "Newtown" and that the plot was "elaborate.''

Acting Monmouth County Prosecutor Christopher Gramiccioni later Monday dismissed those comparisons as inaccurate and said the plan was "non-specific.''

“I think there was probably an internal miscommunication among law enforcement agencies,’’ Gramiccioni said at the time.

But the Wall Police Department later posed a statement to its Facebook page, claiming "many inaccuracies'' in the Wall Patch story.

Among the "inaccuracies" the Police Department was trying to correct, the post reads, was that the student had been removed from the district and that a family member who had weapons was geographically inaccessible to the former student. 

Both of those facts were contained in the original report. 

The post also says the former student was not a fifth grader, which directly contradicts Bilenker's earlier letter, posted on the Wall Township School District site.

The former student is awaiting charges in juvenile court, according to Gramiccioni.