The following two letters were sent out by Theresa Estrada, Superintendent of the Knightsen Elementary School District alerting parents of a suspicious vehicle and following up with what the Sheriff’s investigation uncovered.
Here is the follow up letter
Dear Parents:
The mystery of the suspicious vehicle has been solved. A couple of parents reported seeing the vehicle near the Post-Office. The Sheriff was called out and they checked on the vehicle. It turns out the couple who have been using the bathroom in the mornings are staying in a camper in the area and were using the park bathrooms. The man said that he went into the park bathroom on the campus side because his girlfriend was using the one on the other side.
I spoke with the Sheriff who detained the couple this afternoon. Neither of the two people have any prior arrests for any serious crimes. The man was taken into custody for an old outstanding shoplifting warrant.
The couple has not broken any laws by visiting the park.
We will still keep that gate locked in the mornings for now and parents will still need to enter the school through another gate in the morning.
Theresa Estrada
Superintendent
Here is the original letter:
Dear Parents:
A couple of parents noticed that a vehicle had been parking in the park in the mornings and that the occupant of the vehicle had been entering the campus through the park gate and using the bathroom that is next to the business office. The vehicle is an older black Land Rover. They reported this to Mr. Witte and gave him a description of the vehicle. When asked on Tuesday, the man said that he was a parent of students at the school but did not say who his students were.
Mr. Witte filed a suspicious vehicle report with the Sheriff’s department and they came and watched for the car yesterday and investigated. Last night the Sheriff’s deputy investigating the issue told us that they had located the woman who owned the car and she said that they did not have students at the school and they were only stopping off to use the restroom.
This morning the car was here again and we called the Sheriff again. The sheriff came out, but the car was gone when they got here. We do not know their motives and the park is a public place. However we take your student’s safety seriously and we will continue to be on the lookout for the vehicle. The occupants of the vehicle have not approached any children at this time and have not broken any laws as the park is a public place and simply accessing the park is not against the law.
Because we cannot prevent people from stopping in and using the park during the day, we have decided that it is best to keep the gate that leads from the park onto the campus locked in the mornings. This will mean that parents who enter the campus from the park, will need to walk down and enter the campus through the kinder gate or the office. We are sorry for the inconvenience, but we feel that limiting access from the park to the campus will be safer for our students.
Pick up times will not be affected as students will still be able to walk out the gate and go to the pickup area in the park.
Student Safety is very important to us and we appreciate that the parents who noticed this vehicle and the occupant’s behavior reported it so we could investigate.
Theresa Estrada
Superintendent
Knightsen Elementary School District
