West High School was on a strict lockdown for more than an
hour on Friday morning following a shooting threat. At around 9.30 am, the
Billings Police Department (BPD) dispatch received a phone call saying that
there was a shooting in the math wing at Billings West High School. The BPD
immediately reached out to the West High School Resource Officer (SRO).

The West High SRO placed the building in a precautionary
lockdown at around 9.33 am.

Also Read | Brownsburg shooting: One dead, police on the lookout for shooter

The lockdown was lifted after the police and building
administration conducted a safety check of the building and no evidence of any
safety concerns were discovered.

The threatening call appears to have come from out of the
state, said Billings Police Ben Sergeant Milam in a statement on Friday.

Also Read | Harvey Lane, Bristol shooting: 2 taken to hospital, suspect at large in Virginia

“Multiple officers were already on the scene and everything
is OK,” Milam said. Once the threat was lifted, several parents could be seen
in the school’s parking area picking up their children.

The Billings Police Department has verified that Bozeman,
Helena, Red Lodge, and Forsyth received similar threats. Earlier, similar
threats were called into communities/school districts in the state of Georgia.
These all have been determined to be false threats.

On Wednesday, more than 1,300 students stayed home after a
threat last week at West High. The threat was found written in a bathroom
stall. The threat included the sign of a swastika and said that on December 7
the school would be “shot up.”

Red Lodge High School in Carbon County also got a threat
Friday morning. Red Lodge PD and Carbon Co. Deputies reached on scene soon
after the threat being made and everything was fine, the sheriff’s office said
in a social media post.

Also Read | Who is Patrick Xavier Clark, arrested Takeoff murder suspect?

According to the statement from BPD, there will be an
increase in police presence as a precaution at high schools and middle schools
throughout the day. No arrests have been made and extra police will continue to
be present at schools as the investigation continues.