NW Georgia student arrested on terroristic threats

A northwest Georgia college has suspended a student for making terroristic threats. Reinhardt College in Waleska suspended 24-year-old Ryan Sexson. He was arrested on campus for having two shotguns and 225 rounds of ammunition. Sexson is charged with carrying a weapon on campus and making terroristic threats.

State schools take on bomb threats

Officials in Augusta say their schools are getting far too many bomb threats.

They're joining school boards across the state in an effort to punish the parents of students who make those threats.

Officials say 70 bomb threats came in to schools alone in Richmond County last year.

The public safety response to each threat typically costs the county about $4000 to $8000.

The Georgia School Boards Association says bomb threats are a problem across the state.

Now, they want the legislature to pass a law holding parents accountable for a student's terroristic threats, school violence and theft.

"When we're taking and diverting resources from safety personnel to respond to a false alarm, that means someone else is not getting service and we are passing on a burden of cost to taxpayers that shouldn't be there, because of something that was not a real issue to them," says Dana Bedden, the Richmond County school superintendent.

The threats also disrupt classes, since principals often evacuate the students.

Suspects are often students, according to officials with the Georgia Emergency Management Agency.

In Richmond County, officials say some of the suspects are middle schoolers.

Two girls arrested for high school threats

Two girls have been arrested by Peachtree City police on charges of making terroristic threats against students at McIntosh High School. Authorities say the two girls were threatening to take guns to the school, kill students and then themselves. Officials say the girls talked of their plan on the internet and in the community. The 16-year-old is a student at McIntosh, while the 15-year-old was enrolled in Fayette County’s school system, but was being schooled at home.

College shooting threat: update

Suspect arrested in shooting threat at library.
(Image courtesy Bainbridge College)

Decatur Co. Sheriff Wiley Griffin told GPB News, that law-enforcement officials arrested a student suspect Tuesday night in the case of threats of a shooting attack at Bainbridge College in southwest Georgia:

"The person we arrested is Pamela McGriff, she's a 20-year-old black female. She's from Cairo, Georgia, and is charged with three counts of terroristic threats."

A written threat to “shoot the campus up” on Wednesday was discovered in a women’s restroom at the campus library Monday afternoon.

Griffin says that he does not expect further arrests in the case, although the elevated state of security will remain in effect throughout Wednesday, as a precaution.

"I think it's a very safe environment out there now; I wouldn't have any problem with anyone going to school out there today - none whatsoever."

Griffin added, "We feel very secure that this threat came from this one person,"

but would not confirm or deny that further arrests may be forthcoming in the ongoing investigation.

Georgia Bureau of Investigation local Special Agent, Mike Walsingham, is working with officials in the probe, Griffin says.

Campus (Courtesy Bainbridge College)

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