EAGLE MOUNTAIN — Sheriff's deputies lined up outside the front doors of Eagle Valley Elementary Tuesday morning.

But rather than ushering students quickly out of the building to shelter as school officials did Monday, they were there to give high-fives, fist-bumps and hugs to students as they returned for the first time since Monday's terroristic scare, said Utah County Sheriff's Sgt. Spencer Cannon.

"A lot of kids just came up and gave us hugs," Cannon said. "It was really a delight. It was just a great ray of sunshine to start my day with."

Eagle Valley Elementary did its best to return to normal Tuesday, a day after a man wearing a light green robe and a ski mask and claiming to have a car full of explosives parked a couple of feet from the front door, then ordered everyone to get out.

Christopher Dewitt Craig, 35, of Eagle Mountain, was arrested for investigation of making a terroristic threat, disorderly conduct, disrupting a school, interfering with an arresting officer, and failing to disclose his identity. He was booked into the Utah County Jail, where bail was set at $25,000.

Investigators believe Craig would be an "extreme risk" if he were to bail out of jail, Cannon said. But after searching him, his house and his car into the late night hours, authorities did not find any weapons or explosives, thus accounting for the relatively low bail.

"Didn't find anything at any of those places. Not a total shock, but a little bit of a surprise. We kind of expected that we'd at least find something. But other than a couple of papers he had kind of scribbled on in his car, a schedule of things he was going to do — which pretty much followed what he did — there wasn't anything there. No explosives. No weapons. Not anything like that," he said.

Cannon said the papers found in Craig's car "kind of planned his day out."

At 2:15 p.m. Monday, after already notifying some news outlets in Utah and Texas that he would be doing something at that time, Craig — the former head basketball coach at the College of Eastern Utah, the former assistant coach at Northern Colorado University, and the former head coach at Midland College in Texas — walked into Eagle Valley Elementary. He said his name was Mohammed and told police "the trunk of his car was laced with explosives at (the) front door of the school," according to a police affidavit.

Craig told school administrators to evacuate the building and no one would be hurt, and then walked back outside the building, according to Cannon. As soon as he walked out, school administrators locked the front doors and the rest of the school and began evacuating students out the back.

"If he had in his car what he said he had, there was the potential to cause signficant damage to property and probably even significant risk to life. At the time, we did not know he had nothing, but we had to assume he did," said Cannon, explaining why the school evacuated rather than just keeping the doors locked and the students in place.

Both Cannon and school officials praised the "community effort" to help students on Monday, particularly the teachers who remained calm during the event.

"It was pretty amazing. The school had just practiced (an evacuation drill) a week ago," he said. "No one was panicking. No one was melting down in tears."

Because the early track students had already gone home for the day, only 250 to 300 of the school's 700 students were in the building at the time.

Officers from multiple police agencies surrounded the school. As one deputy approached Craig, he "repeatedly asked Christopher what his true name was and all he stated was 'Patience,' the affidavit states. "After repeated requests for Christopher to end the incident he demanded to address the media. Only after he believed that he had his message delivered did he surrender to law enforcement."

Craig surrendered after about three hours.

On Tuesday, Cannon said he noticed more parents than usual walking their students right up to the front doors of the school. Several parents also came up to him and thanked him for the help from law enforcement officers on Monday.

Counselors were available Tuesday for any student who needed to talk about their feelings. For the most part, said Alpine School District spokesman David Stephenson, the students seemed to be doing well.

"Really, it was pretty calm. Students were just happy to be back in class, as far as I could tell," he said.

District administrators also met the faculty before school started to thank them for their efforts on Monday.

"Generally just an expression of gratitude for what they did to keep the kids calm and safe during the event," Stephenson said.

Related:

Former college coach arrested after bomb threat forces evacuation of Eagle Valley Elementary

Eagle Valley Elementary was evacuated Monday afternoon after a man allegedly told an employee there that his car, parked just outside the school, contained explosives.

Cannon did not know how long Craig may have been planning Monday's event, or what he had been doing in the days leading up to it. But Monday wasn't the first time Craig was accused of making disruptions with religious overtones.

In 2013, Craig allegedly referred to himself as an “Islamic Jihadist” and said Mormons and Catholics would be destroyed. That same year, he was accused of disrupting an Eastern Arizona College class by raising a Bible in the air and shouting at the instructor, asking if he was Mormon.

In 2014, George Dohrmann wrote a story for Sports Illustrated reporting how Craig's once promising basketball career was sidelined by mental illness.

When Craig became the head coach of the College of Eastern Utah, at 25 he was believed to be the youngest coach in college basketball.

But by March 2013, "Craig posted 31 handwritten pages on his blog in which he referred to Mitt Romney as a false prophet and to Obama as the Antichrist. He also called himself the Archangel Michael. He took to Twitter as well, advising people to 'get off coasts by Thurs. at sundown' and asserting that 'WW3 started when Israel bombed Iran.' He did that while still technically the coach at Midland, though on March 21 he sent a resignation letter to school officials," according to Dohrmann's Sports Illustrated story.

"Also in March, Craig journeyed to Israel at the same time Obama was visiting there, and his posted comments about the president being assassinated caught the attention of federal authorities. He was detained and sent back to the U.S.," Dohrmann wrote.

In July 2013, Craig was arrested or detained numerous times, according to Sports Illustrated, including the incidents in Arizona and Colorado. The article said Craig was arrested the next month and admitted to a state hospital in Pueblo, Colorado, and was diagnosed as bipolar with psychotic episodes.

In 2014, police say Craig, wearing a turban and a robe, went to his daughter's school in Price, Utah, and drove his car onto the playground. He was charged with disorderly conduct, driving on a suspended license and failing to give police his real identification. He pleaded guilty last year to attempted reckless endangerment, disorderly conduct and failure to disclose identity.

In January, Craig "became agitated and yelled obscenities at (a) deputy in a threatening manner" during a routine Utah County traffic stop, Cannon said.

Before going to Eagle Valley Elementary on Monday, Craig allegedly sent an email, described by several as rambling and nonsensical, to several media outlets.

"Will call 911 with a threat of an explosive and drive onto my 9 yr olds elementary school, Eagle Valley Elementary, with a True Explosive," part of the email said, according to the El Paso Times.

In the email, Craig said he "was born into this world under the slave name of Christopher Craig. Currently, I am known as The Radical Islamic Jihadist Muhammad Allah Al-Khidr."

"My reason for writing Today is because of my pending arrest and hunger strike which begins when I press send on this Discourse of Truth. In 2 hours, call Eagle Mountain PD in Eagle Mountain, UT if you think I am bluffing. Ask them," according to the El Paso Times.

At one point he allegedly wrote, "Racism is the reason for my hunger strike, to take this conversation deeper, to The Truth, Core, and roots."

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