Girl expelled for bomb threat

11/3/2006

SWANTON - A Swanton High School junior accused of making a bomb threat Oct. 3 that led to the evacuation of the school has been expelled for 80 days, the maximum time allowed by law, and is to remain on probation indefinitely.

The girl, who is 16, was charged with inducing panic, a fourth-degree felony, and was sentenced this week in Fulton County Juvenile Court to 180 days in an Ohio Department of Youth Services facility, but Judge Michael Bumb suspended 174 days and gave her credit for six days she served at the juvenile jail near Stryker, Ohio.

He also suspended a $400 fine. The girl is to meet regularly with a probation officer.

The girl admitted to Swanton police and again in juvenile court that she used a black marker to write on the wall of a stall in the second-floor girls' restroom that the school would be blown up by noon. Her threat included an obscenity.

School officials became aware of the threat about 8:45 a.m. and evacuated about 450 students and about 50 staff members from 10:30 a.m. until 1 p.m. Some students were sent to the middle school gym. Others were kept on school buses.

The decision to expel her from school was made last week by Swanton Superintendent Neil Weber. School leaders also are seeking from the girl more than $240 in restitution that the district paid in overtime for bus drivers to evacuate students after the threat.