Nashua Man Arrested After Bomb Threats At Harvard: Reports

NASHUA, NH — A Nashua man was arrested Tuesday after being accused of phoning in bomb threats to Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and demanding Bitcoin in April, according to officials and multiple reports.

William Giordani is facing charges of conspiracy and aiding and abetting extortionate threats in connection with the events, which included several threatening phone calls and the discovery of explosive items on campus.

According to a Harvard University Police Department log entry from the afternoon of April 13, police were dispatched to the Science Center Plaza at 1 Oxford St. in Cambridge to investigate calls about a bag containing explosive materials.

Boston.com and the Associated Press reported that the caller used a computer-generated voice to make six calls that day to Harvard University police, warning that three bombs had been planted around the campus and would be detonated if a “large bitcoin transaction” was not received.

“If these bombs were detonated now, we estimate that at least 40 students would die and hundreds be badly wounded,” the caller told police, according to Boston.com.

Police only found one bag, which contained a metal locking safe with fireworks inside, a package of wire, and a small rectangular box with wires attached to it, authorities said. With the help of Cambridge police and its police explosive ordinance disposal unit, authorities determined that the items were no longer a threat, according to the police log.

Police said that on April 11, Giordani placed a Craigslist ad posing as a parent of a Harvard student, saying they needed someone to drop off supplies for their son.

The wire in the bag that police recovered had a sticker attached to it with the name used in the Craigslist post printed on it, along with the phone number used both in the ad and most of the calls to police on April 13, authorities said, according to Boston.com.

Giordani later told police “all he did” was respond to a Craigslist ad and “just put some fireworks in a safe and put them at Harvard,” according to an affidavit obtained by The Associated Press.

Giordani has a detention hearing scheduled in federal court in Boston on Friday.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.