Four teenage boys arrested inside Fort Worth’s Stripling Middle School early Sunday morning told police they were “looking for ghosts.”
"As bizarre as it sounds, it all matches up,” said Lt. Paul Henderson, a Fort Worth police spokesman. “They had the blankets and the pillows and the backpacks.”
The boys, ages 13 to 15, said they planned on sleeping in the school to investigate a legend that apparently started years ago, police said.
Many Stripling students have heard the same story -- that ghosts roam the hallways at night.
“It’s like they’re walking around and stuff,” said Brian Davis, 12, a sixth-grader. “It’s like a human that you can’t see.”
"It's scary. It's real scary,” added T.J. Avent, 12, another sixth-grader.
Police did not release the teenagers' names because they are juveniles.
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"To do something stupid like that will get you in real, real trouble," Avent said.
Police got a call about burglars inside the school at 1 a.m. Sunday and arrested the teenagers as they crawled out a window.
They were taken to juvenile detention on trespassing charges.
The school's west Fort Worth neighborhood is now abuzz about what punishment the teens should face.
Neighborhood resident Alison Robinson said they were just "kids being kids."
Nothing was missing from the school, and no damage was done, police said.
The Fort Worth Independent School District is still investigating and hasn’t decided yet whether to prosecute, spokesman Clint Bond said.
"It does have its humorous side,” Henderson said . “Certainly these kids don't deserve too harsh of a punishment for what they did, because it's just kind of comical. But it is illegal."
But Davis said his fellow students were wasting their time.
"I don't believe in ghosts," he said.
FWISD officials said they won't meet or make any decisions about any punishments unitl after the holidays.
