High school football game in Fresno canceled ‘out of abundance of caution’ after shooting
Central Unified School District said Friday’s football game between Central High School and Damonte Ranch-Reno has been canceled “out of an abundance of caution” after last week’s shooting.
Acting Superintendent Ketti Davis on Friday afternoon said district officials received information that “there were concerns out there” after several postings on social media were made aware to the school district and the Fresno Police Department.
Central East was the only school in the Central Unified School District that operated on a minimum day schedule out of safety for the students.
“We would’ve loved to have played, but we felt with the information we had that was the right decision for us to make,” Davis said. “I think it’s important that (there) was not any danger on campus. There was not any threat taking place on campus that caused us to do it. It was an abundance of caution for us. We wanted to make sure that with the information we had at the time we made decisions when we could take care of our students. I believe that’s what we did.”
Central had a plan in place by adding more personnel inside the stadium for safety after last week’s shooting outside the stadium in the parking lot where a 19-year-old was wounded following the Central-Bullard game. A suspect, 19-year-old Taevion Yancey, was arrested.
Police said six officers and a sergeant were going to be assigned at the game.
Police Chief Paco Balderrama on Friday afternoon said his department was going over plans with Central Unified when information about a potential issue was sent via text messages and social media postings were seen by “several 100 people.”
“I can tell you at this point in time we’ve not been able to confirm any such threat whatsoever,” he said. “We don’t believe there was a planned threat on either the school or the football team. Regardless of that, when the administration made the call to early release, we not only pulled our SROs (student resource officers) to the school to make sure the kids were getting home safe, we also pulled officers off the streets and specialized units to make sure that was being done.”
Balderrama added there were some “possible connections” of the postings that were tied to the 15-year-old who was shot twice Thursday morning that took place at in the area of North Dante and West Escalon avenues in northwest Fresno.
“That is what we’re going to follow back on,” he said. “No actual threat made to the school, football games, or any individual but a lot of times what happens on the streets, yeah, it’s connected to chatter and rumors and the information they make to school.”
Balderrama said officers will be in “full force” Friday evening at other football games will take place, but that the incident is isolated to Central East.
Central’s opponent, Damonte Ranch, made the trip to Fresno and will now play Clovis West, which was set to face Redwood in Visalia. The Clovis West-Redwood game was canceled earlier due to COVID-19 concerns.
It is not known if Central will pick up a game later in the season.
“Very unfortunate that this had to happen,” Balderrama said. “To me, the losers are really the kids who are not able to make memories tonight and play their football game because of something that is going on social media.
“We really hope to come up with a more comprehensive plan so we can address this in the future and not have to shut things down, but if we ever think if something is going to happen we will continue to work together with CUSD to make the best decision possible. I feel the best decision was made.”
This story was originally published August 27, 2021 at 1:17 PM.
