A student died Wednesday after falling from the fourth floor of Benjamin Franklin High School in Highland Park, police said. The Los Angeles Police Department said officers described the student as a boy and that the fall happened at about 1 p.m. His name and age have not been released.
The circumstances remain under investigation, and police say there is no evidence of foul play at this time, according to NBC Los Angeles. The outlet also reported that it had contacted the Los Angeles Unified School District for more information.
Campus Locked Down Following the Fall
According to NBC Los Angeles, LAUSD told parents the campus was under lockdown because of a medical emergency and that the restriction would continue until law enforcement issued an all-clear. Under the district’s Integrated Safe School Plan, students remain inside locked classrooms until school leaders or police announce the all-clear. Each school updates the protocol annually.
NBC Los Angeles reported that LAPD officers assisted the Los Angeles School Police Department with the death investigation. The school police department has primary jurisdiction on campus, with LAPD assisting in fatal incidents.
California’s School-Facility Assessment Requirements
California requires school districts and county offices of education to assess school facilities for safety, cleanliness, adequacy, and needed maintenance to ensure they are in good repair, according to CBS Sacramento. The requirement identifies both districts and county offices as responsible for assessments; it does not indicate that a building condition contributed to this fall.
LAUSD’s Crisis-Response Framework
LAUSD’s Suicide Prevention, Intervention, and Postvention Policy Bulletin, BUL-2637.5, sets out four-stage procedures for student mental health emergencies and post-event support. The policy complies with California Assembly Bill 2246, which requires comprehensive suicide postvention plans. The existence of the policy does not confirm that it was activated in response to this fall.
LAUSD’s mental health office says the district’s Crisis Counseling and Intervention Services teams, which include psychiatric social workers, offer counseling to students, staff, and families after major traumatic incidents. The teams typically coordinate with school police and local administrators during campus emergencies.
Support for Students and Families
LAUSD’s mental health office says its Crisis Counseling and Intervention Services teams offer counseling to students, staff and families after major traumatic incidents. The teams include psychiatric social workers and typically coordinate with school police and local administrators during campus emergencies. The Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health also lists Soluna, a free wellbeing app for teens and young adults ages 13–25.
A School With a History of Lockdowns
Benjamin Franklin High School, founded in 1916, is one of Northeast Los Angeles' oldest secondary schools and serves roughly 1,400 students across its core high school, STEM Magnet, and Dual Language Academy programs. Wednesday's lockdown was not the campus's first in recent memory.
The Los Angeles Times reported that Franklin High was placed on lockdown in January 2025 after a student was injured in a stabbing outside the campus entrance. And in August 2024, a student from another school was stabbed on campus during a preseason football scrimmage, an incident that prompted district leaders to deploy additional security personnel, per the Los Angeles Times.
Highland Park's Close-Knit Community Feels the Loss
Highland Park is a dense, historic Northeast Los Angeles neighborhood of nearly 49,000 residents, with households containing children making up 29 percent of local homes, according to U.S. Census Bureau data published by Point2Homes. A tragedy at one of the neighborhood's oldest schools reverberates widely in a community where so many families have children in local classrooms.
Nationally, suicide ranked as the second leading cause of death among Americans aged 10 to 24 in 2023, according to mortality data released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in September 2025. Public health officials have pointed to school-based mental health support as critical to prevention efforts, underscoring why crisis response protocols like LAUSD's are activated so quickly after an incident like Wednesday's fall.
The student’s identity and the cause of the fall have not been released. The investigation remains ongoing.
