Portsmouth High School shooting threat suspect charged with possessing gun in school zone

Ian Lenahan, Portsmouth Herald
·3 min read

CONCORD — A federal grand jury has indicted Portsmouth High School shooting threat suspect Kyle Hendrickson for allegedly possessing a firearm in a school zone, New Hampshire U.S. Attorney Jane Young announced Thursday afternoon.

The 25-year-old from Berwick, Maine, who was arrested on a criminal complaint in April, has been indicted on the possession charge and for a single count of interstate threatening communications.

It is alleged that on April 12, Hendrickson, having just dropped off his mother at Portsmouth High School, took a Snapchat video from inside a car showing him brandishing a handgun. The video contained a text overlay, reading: “Imma gonna shoot up the school.”

Still shots of the Snapchat video allegedly made by Kyle Hendrickson, who is facing charges for allegedly threatening to shoot up Portsmouth High School.
Still shots of the Snapchat video allegedly made by Kyle Hendrickson, who is facing charges for allegedly threatening to shoot up Portsmouth High School.

Portsmouth schools were closed the following day as a result of the threat. At that point, Hendrickson was still at large.

Police set out to find Hendrickson on April 13. As Portsmouth students stayed home for the day, he was found and apprehended that afternoon in Portland, Maine. Hendrickson was taken to the Portsmouth police station for booking a few days later and subsequently to Concord for his initial federal court appearance.

Young’s office announced after Hendrickson’s arrest that the car he was driving, a 2014 Ford Explorer, was found stocked with weapons and ammunition.

Kyle Hendrickson, 25, was arrested by Portland, Maine police last week on a charge of criminal threatening with a firearm after allegedly posting an alleged social media threat to shoot up Portsmouth High School. Hendrickson additionally faces a federal charge of "transmitting in interstate commerce a threat to injure the person of another," per New Hampshire U.S. Attorney Jane Young.

“School surveillance footage placed Hendrickson’s vehicle outside the high school at the time of the video,” a news release on Thursday reads. “Law enforcement recovered an AR-15 rifle, a shotgun, camouflage body armor, a handgun holster, a red-dot sight, and numerous rounds of ammunition from Hendrickson’s vehicle. A handgun that resembles the one used in the SnapChat video was also recovered near a motel where Hendrickson had stayed on April 12, 2023.”

New Hampshire does not have a law preventing people who are not students from possessing a firearm in a school zone. However, the Gun-Free School Zones Act signed into law in 1990 prohibits individuals from knowingly possessing a firearm in a school zone, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.

“Any pupil who brings or possesses a firearm – concealed or otherwise – in a safe school zone (any school property or school bus) without written authorization from the superintendent shall be expelled from school by the local school board for at least 12 months,” said the Giffords Law Center, referencing state law.

Portsmouth Superintendent of Schools Zach McLaughlin told the School Board on Tuesday the district is in the midst of identifying costs associated with closing all city schools for a day due to the alleged threat.

“They have asked us to monetize, to the best of our ability, what restitution might look like, but no additional steps have been taken to this point. We’ve reached out to … folks within the leadership team for what we would identify as costs that were incurred as a result of dealing with the threat and the school closure,” he said. “We’ve received information and we’re in the process of trying to put a dollar figure on those things, and we’ll be in contact with the U.S. attorney’s office to see what could happen from there.”

Each charge against Hendrickson, according to Young’s office, carries a sentence of up to five years, up to three years of supervised release and a fine upwards of $250,000. Potential sentences would be imposed by a federal district court judge.

Portsmouth police and the FBI led the investigation, assisted by the Federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives, the Somersworth Police Department, the Portland Police Department, and the Berwick Police Department.

The case against Hendrickson is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Charles L. Rombeau.

Court documents filed earlier this summer indicated Hendrickson’s defense was negotiating a plea deal with the state, though that has not been finalized. U.S. Magistrate Judge Andrea Johnstone approved a motion last month from Hendrickson’s lawyers recommending he participate in a therapeutic community program at the Strafford County House of Corrections.

This article originally appeared on Portsmouth Herald: Portsmouth NH shooting threat suspect charged for gun in school zone