US authorities announced that a Washington state man has been sentenced to three years in prison for making 20 false reports of bomb and shooting incidents across the US and Canada that actually prompted emergency responses.
Ashton Connor Garcia, 21, of Bremerton, was sentenced Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Tacoma, according to a statement from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District of Washington. Garcia pleaded guilty in January to two counts of racketeering and two counts of making threats and fabricating explosives.
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As part of the plea agreement, Garcia admitted that he intended to make the calls to dispatch SWAT teams, bomb squads and other law enforcement agencies to the targeted locations.
Federal prosecutors said Garcia used internet-based voice calling technology to conceal his identity when making so-called swatting calls between June 2022 and March 2023, and also broadcast the calls on social media platforms.
A Washington state man who pleaded guilty to making 20 false reports about bombings and shootings across the United States and Canada has been sentenced to three years in prison.
In two cases, he placed fake bomb threats on a Fox News station in Cleveland and on a flight from Honolulu to Los Angeles, and in another case, he threatened to blow up the Los Angeles airport unless he received $200,000 in Bitcoin, prosecutors said.
Prosecutors said the suspect collected personal information from multiple victims and threatened to send emergency responders to their homes if they did not hand over money, credit card information and sexually explicit images.
Authorities said police entered some homes at gunpoint and took people into custody.
According to prosecutors, the plea agreement details 20 false emergency call counts targeting victims in California, Georgia, Illinois, Kentucky, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Washington and Edmonton, Alberta.
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Garcia’s arrest comes amid a wave of threats and false reports of active shooter incidents at schools and universities across the country, including a renewed surge in false call attempts, many aimed at public officials, earlier this year and late last year.
Some swatting incidents have led to police shooting people, and authorities say they are concerned about diverting resources from real emergencies.
