A 20-year-old former student of Fernandina Beach High School has been arrested for writing threats to “shoot up” the school.
Fernandina Beach Police say they were contacted by the FBI, after threats were reported to the FBI Tipline by two people outside of Florida. Those people took screenshots of threats posted to an anonymous chat site on December 30th.
“My name is Wesley Twiggs and I am going to shoot up Fernandina Beach High School on January 15th. I will be on the news … so you better keep these messages if you want anyone to believe that this conversation took place,” the threat said, according to police.
Police contacted the parents of 20-year-old Wesley Twiggs initially, and then made contact with Twiggs, who reportedly confessed to posting two threats. Police say they arrested him for the second-degree felony charge of written threats to kill, do bodily harm, or conduct a mass shooting or an act of terrorism. They say the charge is based on evidence and his confession, as well as “a compelling pattern of escalating and concerning behavior”, although no firearms were recovered, nor do police have evidence to indicate he would have access to guns or planned to actually carry out the threat.
The Law Officer of Bossen and Jamieson emphasized that there was no evidence of an actual plan to harm anyone, in a statement they released about this case. They have been retained to represent Twiggs, and the statement says he and his family have fully cooperated with the investigation. The Law Officer further says Twiggs is receiving in-patient treatment at a residential facility at this time.
If you have any information you believe is relevant to this investigation, police are asking you to contact detective Stephen Moreno at 904-310-3222.