Canton Police Continue Investigation of Threatening P-CEP Note

continue investigating that closed the Plymouth-Canton Educational Park on Monday. One detective, Canton Police Sgt. Dave Schreiner, said tips are coming in and being examined. A threatening note, which police said may have been from a troubled student, touched off the police response the early dismissal from classes.

Mainly, police are investigating the circumstances of , left in what Schreiner described as "a secure area" of that is well traveled by teachers and students when school is in session.

Salem is part of a three-school campus which includes and high schools, often referred to simply as the Park or P-CEP. After the note was discovered Monday morning, police were alerted and the schools were put into partial lockdown, followed by a controlled dismissal of classes. Students returned to school Tuesday morning but have been assigned and the district has assigned more adults to help the administrators on duty at the Park.

The typewritten note indicates the writer had "been mistreated and were unhappy with their social status or social standing," Schreiner said, adding that the message showed someone "frustrated with the way in which they feel they've been treated and wanted to carry out their hurt feelings with acts of violence, with specific times being mentioned."

Plymouth-Canton Schools' spokesman Frank Ruggirello Jr. said P-CEP does have surveillance cameras but declined for safety reasons to say where they are located.

Police are asking for tips from students, teachers and others at the Park; the district is offering a reward of $1,000 if a tip leads to an arrest.

Schreiner said the note is being examined forensically to help determine whether the writer is a student or adult, male or female and whether it is a legitimate note or a hoax.

The note was found by a Salem High teacher, Schreiner said, adding that, based on where it was, the writer wanted it to be found. He said it is not clear yet whether the note is related to any previous incident at the school or not.

While every tip is valuable, Schreiner indicated the more specific the tip is, the more it helps investigators. He said it's important for students and staff at P-CEP to "keep their eyes and ears open" and continue offering tips. He also offered a message to the person or people who wrote the note:

"And if the person that wrote this letter if it's one or more, we'd also ask them to do the right thing and come forward," Schreiner said. Police and school administrators want to know, he said, the "rationale for passing on this note. Come forward and do the right thing and explain your actions and intentions.

"We don't want to focus on what kind of trouble they're going to be in," he said. "I'd rather focus on the trouble this causes for other people and the trouble that will be caused by not coming forward."

Assuming the note is legitimate, he added, "it suggests there's someone at the school that has some problem that has to be addressed. Our concern is to care for the person or people that did this."

Tips can be shared by calling Canton Township's Department of Public Safety at 734-394-5400.