Two Yorkville schools take security precautions in wake of unrelated incidents

Two unrelated incidents Wednesday morning resulted in security precautions being taken at two Yorkville school buildings Wednesday morning, including a brief soft lockdown.

The Yorkville Police Department received a call at about 8:35 a.m. reporting that a suspicious female was walking away from Circle Center Grade School, 901 Mill St., carrying what the caller said appeared to be a BB gun.

“Our guys flooded the area but we were not able to substantiate the call,” Yorkville police Commander Garrett Carlyle said. “There did not appear to be a threat.”

There was no lockdown ordered for the school, Carlyle said.

“It didn’t rise to that level of concern,” Carlyle said.

However, security officers from Yorkville School District Y115 are expected to remain at Circle Center and at the nearby Yorkville Intermediate School, 103 E. Schoolhouse Road, for the rest of the day.

Yorkville police sent its school resource officer to the schools and patrol officers stepped up their visits to the neighborhood.

Then at 10:15 a.m. the U.S. Marshal’s Office contacted Yorkville police to announce that it was about to conduct an investigation in the area of the two schools.

As a result, a soft lockdown was ordered at both schools, meaning people could move about freely inside the building but no one was allowed in or out of the buildings, Carlyle said.

The outcome of the visit by the federal officers is not known, Carlyle said, but the soft lockdown was lifted after about 15 minutes.

“These were two completely unrelated incidents,” Carlyle said.

The school district’s spokesman, Director of Marketing and Storytelling Brent Edwards, said standard security procedures were followed in both incidents.

“At no point were any teachers, students or staff in any danger,” Edwards said.