Authorities Arrest Two Teenage Girls for Allegedly Plotting 'Mass Casualty Attack' at Texas High School

The girls, 15 and 16, were taken into custody on Tuesday. Their names were not released by authorities because they are minors. The FBI field office in Houston said it had received information "that two underage teenagers from the Houston area were plotting a mass casualty attack at a local school." "Our Threat Mitigation Team immediately responded to help @houstonpolice & @MCTXSheriff identify and arrest them," the agency said in a post on X. The alleged threat involved the girls using guns and placing pipe bombs at Memorial High School in the Houston suburb of Hedwig Village, NBC affiliate KPRC of Houston reported. Authorities said the girls were in the early stages of planning the attack and were arrested within 30 minutes of learning about it, the station reported.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) said it thwarted a “mass casualty attack” plot involving two teens in Texas. Law enforcement says the 15- and 16-year-old girls were planning to use pipe bombs and guns in an attack at a high school in Harris County, Texas. The FBI reportedly moved quickly on Tuesday, Feb. 18, after learning of the plot from local authorities, and found the girls within 30 minutes of the call, taking both of them into custody. Authorities said the 16-year-old suspect is a student at the targeted high school and is being held on a charge of making a terrorist threat, while the other student, who is 15, is being held on an unrelated charge.

The two girls, ages 15 and 16, were arrested in an operation orchestrated by the FBI, the Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office and the Spring Branch ISD Police Department — with authorities handcuffing the pair just 30 minutes after hearing of the online threats, according to Click 2 Houston. Memorial High School in Houston, Texas, was the alleged target of the two underage masterminds — who planned on placing pipe bombs around the school and using guns to then pick off panicking students and teachers, the Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office said. The 16-year-old girl was a student at Memorial High and was arrested in a hallway inside the school. She has been charged with making a terroristic threat, which is a third-degree felony, according to the Spring Branch ISD Police Department.