Bomb threats may be tied to copycats

Copycats may be behind three bomb threats made in the Miami Valley within the past four days.

The latest threat was called into the Montgomery County Regional Dispatch Monday morning. The caller said there was a bomb at the RTA hub at 4 S. Main St. However, Dayton police did not find a device.

The call came just two days after someone called a restaurant at The Greene in Beavercreek, Brio, and claimed there was a bomb there. Beavercreek police swept the restaurant but found nothing.

The day before that, on Friday, a caller claimed there were bombs at the Dayton Public Schools busing garage and at Eastmont School and Carroll High School. Both Dayton police and Riverside police investigated that claim, and used bomb dogs from Wright Patterson Air Force Base to sweep the buildings but did not find a bomb. Each case is still under investigation, and police said there’s no reason to believe the calls are tied to one another.

The threats were made after intense media coverage of terror threats in Europe, specifically Paris, and it’s likely the callers, who all sounded like adults, made them in an attempt to “copycat” threats there, and gain attention, said Donna Schlagheck, a political science professor at Wright State University who teaches undergraduate classes on terrorism ideologies.

“One concern… has been realized here in Dayton, Ohio, with maybe copycats and possibly politically serious threats behind them,” Schlagheck said. “But that still costs a lot of time, it costs money. You’ve shaken some people in the public. You’ve cost law enforcement in terms of time and manpower.”

Those who’ve made the fake bomb threats can be prosecuted. Making false alarms is a first-degree misdemeanor, while inducing panic can be a felony, depending on the financial cost and nature of the incident, according to the Ohio Revised Code.

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