KENT, Wash. — After three brawls erupted in a high school cafeteria on Thursday afternoon, the district is trying to dispel rumors circulating on social media.
The rumors, as well as callers to the KIRO 7 Eyewitness News newsroom, said Kent-Meridian High School was in lockdown and the fights were gang-related.
Administrators told KIRO what really happened was one fight broke out, and as security and teachers broke it up, another brawl erupted in another part of the cafeteria, which can have 400 to 500 students in it at one time.
Police were called when a third, separate group of students started fighting minutes later, and students started a mass exodus out of the cafeteria into the student commons area.
Administrators said order was restored, the fights were not gang-related, no one was seriously hurt and they never put the school on lockdown.
“Three fights on the same campus in a five, six, seven minute period is a bad day, no doubt about it. (I’m) not trying to sugar coat it, not trying to be dismissive of it at all. But it was not some organized choreographed riot situation that some people have tried to paint it as. It was three separate groups of high school students behaving badly,” said Chris Loftis with Kent Public Schools.
The students involved will be disciplined with suspensions.
Administrators said 2,000 students go to Kent-Meridian, more than in some entire districts, and they want to assure parents they have the staff in place to keep students safe.