Police, Schools to Hold Community Forum Following Swatting Incident at Johnson Park School

The Princeton Police Department and Princeton Public Schools will co-host a forum on “swatting” after the most recent incident at Johnson Park School on Tuesday morning.

The forum will take place on Thursday, Oct. 29, 7 p.m. in the auditorium at John Witherspoon Middle School.

Princeton Public Schools Superintendent Steve Cochrane and Princeton Police Chief Nick Sutter will be present to speak and provide information on actions that are being taken in response to the incidents and to answer questions of the public.

All Community members are encouraged to attend. The forum will be held in the school auditorium.

A ”swatting” incident is when a school or other public place receives a pre-recorded bomb threat that turns out to be unfounded.

Princeton Police responded to a swatting incident at Johnson Park School at 9:24 a.m. Tuesday morning.

The school received a phone call with a computerized voice claiming to have a bomb inside the school and threatening to detonate it.

Princeton Police responded with a police K-9 and checked both the inside and outside of the school. Police determined that there was no credible threat.

The incident is the fourth since the school year began, but the first since Sept. 30, when a threat was called in to John Witherspoon School.

Similar calls were received last month at Princeton High School and Riverside Elementary School. Each of those incidents, as well as a rash of ”swatting” incidents that plagued the town earlier this year, were all determined to be unfounded.