Two Winfield teens have been charged in Cowley County District Court with making criminal threats to cause the evacuation of Winfield High School this spring.
A third complaint was filed against a 12-year-old boy, but District Judge Nick St.Peter closed the file to the public because of the defendant’s age.
The two complaints open to the public were filed May 23 by County Attorney Christopher Smith against Michael Nathan Mason and Chad Todd Lewis.
Both youths were 16-years-old when the alleged threats were made and are identified by name in the court records. They are charged as juveniles. The documents do not specify whether the boys were students when they made the alleged threats.
Mason is charged with making a threat on March 8th and Lewis on May 15. They each face one count which states they “unlawfully and feloniously communicate(d) a threat to commit violence, with the intent to cause the evacuation of a building, to wit: Winfield High School, or made such threat with reckless disregard of the risk of causing such evacuation…”
The May incident occurred on a Tuesday. Both the high school and middle schools were evacuated the following Friday because of a series of bomb threats that week, according to a statement issued by USD 465 the following Monday. Students walked to Southwestern College’s Stewart Field House accompanied by teachers and staff. Parents were asked to go to the field house to pick up their children.
Kansas Highway Patrol officers searched both schools with bomb-sniffing dogs but nothing unusual was discovered.
Winfield police officials have previously said that three suspects had been identified in connection with making the threats.
The two older boys facing criminal proceedings have been ordered to appear before St. Peter on June 13. Mason is scheduled for 10:30 a.m. and Lewis for 11 a.m. The presiding judge has the authority to close juvenile proceedings to the public at any time but has not yet done so.
Criminal threat – if committed by an adult – would be classified as a level nine person felony, according to court records.
