3 Teens Held in Alleged Rape, Threats at Schools

One week after the FBI named this the third-safest big city in the country, a Saugus High School student was arrested for allegedly raping a classmate, and two other boys were detained after they threatened to harm their peers, police said.

Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies and school officials said the close timing of the incidents, which all occurred during school hours Wednesday, was a coincidence. Still, it was a clear sign that despite the city’s relatively low crime rate, Santa Clarita is not immune to the type of teenage violence seen elsewhere in the country recently.

In one incident, deputies from the Santa Clarita Sheriff’s Station said, a 13-year-old at Arroyo Seco Junior High School in Valencia told classmates that he would soon be as infamous as Kipland Kinkel, the 15-year-old Springfield, Ore., student who allegedly killed his parents, then opened fire in a school cafeteria May 21, leaving two students dead and 22 injured.

“[The Arroyo Seco student] made some pretty specific threats about other students,” said Lt. Tim Peters. “We know that we can’t just brush off these threats. If you do, you can have some problems.”

Santa Clarita Mayor Jan Heidt agreed. “I think we would be wrong to think we are somehow immune,” said Heidt. “This is pretty much a mirror of what we’ve seen throughout the country.

Although on-campus violence is rare in Santa Clarita, both police and school officials say that the recent spate of deadly incidents in other parts of the nation has made them more vigilant when it comes to dealing with threats from students.

Arroyo Seco Principal Jacque Snyder said that several students heard the youngster make threatening remarks and reported them to school administrators. The school conducted its own investigation and, in accordance with state law, reported the threats to sheriff’s deputies, who took the boy into custody.

“It was very frightening to the kids who heard it,” Snyder said. “We are trying to teach our students to be proactive in these situations, so we’re glad they came forward to tell us what they’d heard.”

In the second incident, an eighth-grader at La Mesa Junior High School in Canyon Country, also 13, allegedly threatened fellow students and was also detained at school Wednesday by sheriff’s deputies.

Unlike circumstances in the Oregon incident, Peters said, neither boy was armed or had access to guns. “We don’t consider them to be a threat at this time,” said Peters, who added that both boys were released to their parents.

However, Peters said that the Sheriff’s Department would ask the district attorney to file charges against the boys for making terrorist threats.

Deputies said the 16-year-old suspect in the rape case was a known gang member.