Senior prank lands 2 North Carolina students in jail on felony charges

IREDELL COUNTY, N.C. -- Police didn't find a senior prank funny, and now two students are facing felony charges.

Shannon Farrell and Lakia Hall, both 18 years old, say they first told their parents about the prank.

"They took alarm clocks; she told us what she was going to do. They took alarm clocks and put them in lockers no longer used and set them to go off every few minutes," Farrell's father told ABC affiliate WSOC-TV.

The problem? A school resource officer found one of the alarm clocks in the lockers and thought it was a bomb.

"It raised suspicion because, number one, the alarm was going off inside," Troutman Police Chief Matthew Selves told WBTV. "These are lockers that are not used by students."

The school's 1,700 students were evacuated while bomb sniffing dogs were called in. No explosive devices were ever found.

Both teens were later charged with felony hoax charges for putting a 'false bomb' in a public building.

"(We've) got to take this very seriously. Even though it was a hoax we had to get all the resources, lock the school down, get the students out to the football field safe and sound," Selves told WSOC-TV.

Selves said both students had sent a message out to others at the school on social media telling them to bring alarm clocks. Farrell told WBTV after her arrest that she and other students didn't realize the prank would cause a problem.

"I thought it was kind of funny, you know, have one go off every couple minutes something happen, teachers running everywhere to get them, but I guess the more I think about it now, I guess it was kind of silly in today's world with all the bomb threats and everything," Farrell said. "(I) never thought about it that way."