Metal detectors were installed Friday at Benjamin N. Cardozo High School — the day after a 16-year-old student was busted for allegedly threatening on social media to shoot up the Queens school.
A 9-mm. handgun was found in a teen’s backpack just hours after the student’s threats to shoot up the Bayside school on social media were uncovered by the FBI, officials said. The teen, who has not been named, is facing charges of gun possession and making terroristic threats.
The use of metal detectors at New York City schools is determined on a building-by-building basis and Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch said Friday that scanners are placed in schools where guns are a particular concern.
“The fact of the matter is, for the past year at Cardozo, we have not had a single report or incident involving a gun, so that school had not previously been a candidate for scanning,” Tisch said.
Tisch also said the weapon found in the teenager’s backpack was legally purchased in South Carolina by a licensed gun owner on Jan. 9. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives is investigating how the gun wound up in the hands of the suspect, Tisch said.
“The school should have better security,” a 15-year-old Cardozo student told the News Friday.
Tisch said metal detectors would be used at the Bayside school “for the foreseeable future,” and when students showed up Friday morning for class there was a stepped-up police presence.
“The school opened this morning without incident,” Tisch said. “We are doing scanning at the school. Historically, this has not been a scanning school but there was scanning this morning and will continue to be for the foreseeable future.”
The student, a 10th grader at Cardozo, posted on Instagram at 10:17 a.m. Thursday a photo of what looked like a school worksheet with the caption “TS GMT boutta shoot the school up” — using an acronym Tisch said means, “This s— gets me tight,” officials said.
The arrest took place after the Federal Bureau of Investigation alerted the NYPD about the student’s disturbing social media post. META, Instagram’s parent company, immediately alerted the FBI since the post violated the social-media site’s terms of service, according to court documents.
The teen’s IP address from Instagram was tracked back to the school. FBI agents were then able to find the teen’s phone number.
A school safety agent apprehended the student, who had on a backpack and was on his phone, inside a conference room at the school. The safety agent then asked him what classroom he was in.
“When they took me? Or when I made the post? Like when he took me out of or when I took the picture?” the teen said, according to court documents.
The safety agent searched the youth’s bag and found the 9-mm. pistol, a black Taurus GX4 loaded with a magazine containing 11 bullets, plus a magazine extender containing two more rounds of ammunition, according to the criminal complaint.
Two 9-mm. bullets were subsequently found during a consent search of the teen’s bedroom closet, Tisch said.
At the boy’s Friday afternoon arraignment at Queens Supreme Court, Judge Leigh Cheng ordered him held him on $100,000 cash bail, $350,000 insured bond or $250,000 in partially secured bond.
He was due back in court on Sept. 26.
The teen’s lawyer did not respond to request for comment by the Daily News.
A 15-year-old Cardozo student outside school Friday said he was in his seventh-period global history class when his teacher abruptly locked the door as Thursday’s incident unfolded.
“They didn’t tell us anything,” he said. “They just told us it was a cold lockdown for seven minutes probably, and they just locked all the doors. They went right back to teaching like nothing was happening.”
“I think they should tell us who it was and everything,” he said of the school’s response.
Another Cardozo student said he thought it was “crazy” that a classmate had access to a gun. “I’m 16 too, so I don’t know how he’s in that position to do something like that,” the student said. “I’m just trying to get into college right now. It’s honestly crazy.”
During an online meeting Friday morning to discuss the troubling incident, parents voiced concern about the decision only to put the school on “hold” for just four minutes instead of a full lockdown.
Following protocol, the school did not go on hard lockdown because there was no confirmation a gun was present until the student suspect was already being escorted out, Cardozo Principal Meagan Colby explained.
But angry parents said it shouldn’t take 100% confirmation of a gun before the school locks down.
Parents also expressed concern about the state’s new cell-phone ban, under which students do not have access to electronic devices during the day. One of the major criticisms of the policy, which is mandatory at all New York public schools, is that parents would not be able to reach their children in the event of an emergency.
“I get that is concerning to a number of you, but we must abide by that law,” Colby explained.
Originally Published: September 19, 2025 at 11:22 AM EDT
