Police Investigating Mayor Buckhorn's Twitter Hack Attack

TAMPA, FL -- They weren't the kind of tweets followers of Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn are accustomed to receiving. These tweets were downright scary.

Tampa Police say someone hacked into the mayor's twitter account around 4 a.m. Thursday and posted obscene, racist, homophobic and threatening tweets.

The City of Tampa became aware of the intrusion Thursday morning when Tampa International Police were alerted about a message on the mayor's Twitter page claiming a bomb had been hidden in a package at the airport targeting minorities.

Buckhorn's aide, Ashley Bauman, released the following statement:

Earlier this morning we noticed someone hacked Mayor Buckhorn's twitter account, this was clearly not Mayor Buckhorn. Upon noticing the hack we immediately began investigating these reprehensible tweets. We will work with our Tampa Police Department as well as all investigators to figure out how this breach was made. We urge residents to change their passwords and continue to alert officials when they see an unlikely change in account activity. We are working with law enforcement to investigate all threats made by this hack.

Buckhorn was on a camping trip at the time and was unaware of the hack. It took several hours to regain control of the mayor's Twitter account.

Tampa Police spokesman Steven Hegarty said police are searching for the hacker who will face charges for posting threats.

"TPD detectives are working to determine who is behind the despicable messages," he said, adding that none of the threats were deemed credible.

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