Students from Florida schools will use transparent backpacks
The students of the school of Parkland, Florida, where 17 people died in a firefight on February 14, received plastic bags and clear backpacks upon return to school, where they must carry their belongings for an unspecified time. After the spring break, Marjory Stoneman Douglas students received free bags and backpacks for mandatory use to enter with school and personal supplies in the educational center.
This is one of the security measures that the school district has implemented in the aftermath of the massacre perpetrated by Nikolas Cruz, 19, who shot and killed 14 students and three teachers. The students who returned to the classrooms this week found themselves with only four entry points available early, and after the beginning of the classes, only one open, according to the Sun Sentinel newspaper. "It's a test to see how it works, the process will be very similar to when you enter a sporting event, a concert or even Disney World," he wrote in a note to the parents of the students Ty Thompson, the school's director.
Students will be allowed to enter with equipment in sports bags or music instruments in cases that are not transparent, but the belongings will be reviewed. The governor of Florida, Rick Scott, ordered the presence of eight agents of the Highway Patrol in the high school, in addition to the surveillance of police in Broward County, where the school is located.
In addition to the shooting, a series of incidents that have caused concern and nervousness, such as threats on social networks and the arrest of two students for entering the campus with knives, have been registered at the school. Added to this is the recent sentence of six months of probation for Zachary Cruz, brother of Nikolas Cruz, author of the massacre, who was arrested for entering the institute, something that the police had prohibited.
Nikolas Cruz, a former high school student from Parkland, a residential city near Fort Lauderdale, Florida, arrived on the day of the crime in an Uber taxi to the school with a suitcase carrying an assault rifle. Once inside one of the class buildings, he took out the gun and began firing indiscriminately. Seventeen people, fourteen of them students, died as a result of the shooting. Cruz was arrested shortly after leaving a hamburger and confessed to the police that he was the one who shot at the school.