Today, the U.S. Department of Justice announced that Alan W. Filion, 18, of Lancaster, California, pleaded guilty yesterday to four counts of making interstate threats to injure the person of another. Filion faces a maximum penalty of five years in prison on each count. A sentencing date has not yet been set.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Swatting is making a false report to the police with the intention of luring them to a location\u00a0by saying\u00a0a violent crime has taken place or\u00a0is in progress.\u00a0 The dangerous hoax has been on the FBI\u2019s radar for nearly two decades and became more\u00a0widely known\u00a0as celebrities were targeted. The troubling trend recently took a political turn as federal judges and lawmakers have been subject to the false emergency calls, along with state capitol buildings and even the White House.<\/em>\u00a0 ~ The Mercury News<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cAlan Filion not only intended to cause as much harm as possible, but he also attempted to profit from these criminal activities by offering swatting-for-a-fee services,\u201d said FBI Deputy Director Paul Abbate. \u201cSwatting poses severe danger to first responders and victims, wastes significant time and resources, and creates fear in communities. The FBI will continue to work with partners to aggressively investigate and hold accountable anyone who engages in these activities.”<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n According to his plea agreement, from approximately August 2022 to January 2024, Filion made more than 375 swatting and threat calls, including calls in which he claimed to have planted bombs in the targeted locations or threatened to detonate bombs and\/or conduct mass shootings at those locations. He targeted religious institutions, high schools, colleges and universities, government officials, and numerous individuals across the United States. Filion was 16 at the time he placed the majority of the calls.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Filion intended for his calls to cause large-scale deployment of police and emergency-services units to the targeted locations. During these calls, he provided information to law enforcement and emergency services agencies that he knew to be false, such as false names, false claims that he and others had placed explosives in particular locations, false claims that he and others possessed dangerous weapons, including firearms and explosives, and false claims that he and\/or other individuals had committed, or intended to imminently commit, violent crimes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n During the time that dispatchers spent on the phone with Filion, they were unavailable to respond to other emergencies. Additionally, in response to many of his calls, armed law enforcement officers were dispatched to the targeted addresses, and likewise were made unavailable to respond to other emergencies. In some instances, armed law enforcement officers approached and entered targeted residences with their weapons drawn and detained individuals who occupied the residences.<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n In a post on Jan. 20, 2023, Filion claimed that when he swats someone, he \u201cusually get[s] the cops to drag the victim and their families out of the house, cuff them and search the house for dead bodies.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n Filion evolved into a serial swatter for both profit and recreation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n He claimed in a Jan. 19, 2023, online post that his \u201cfirst\u201d swatting was like \u201c2 to 3 years ago\u201d and that \u201c6-9 months ago [he] decided to turn it into a business. . .\u201d On several occasions, Filion placed posts on social-media channels advertising his services and swatting-for-a-fee structure.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n On January 18, Filion, then 17-years-old, was arrested in California on Florida state charges arising from a May 2023 threat he made to a religious institution in Sanford, Florida. In that threat, he claimed to have an illegally modified AR-15, a Glock 17 pistol, pipe bombs, and Molotov cocktails. He said that he was going to imminently \u201ccommit a mass shooting\u201d and \u201ckill everyone\u201d he saw. Filion pleaded guilty yesterday in federal court to making that threat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Filion has remained in custody since his arrest on Florida state charges back in January.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Filion also pleaded guilty to making three other threatening calls \u2013 an October 2022 call to a public high school in the Western District of Washington, in which he threatened to commit a mass shooting and claimed to have planted bombs throughout the school; a May 2023 call to a Historically Black College & University in the Northern District of Florida, in which he claimed to have placed bombs in the walls and ceilings of campus housing that would detonate in about an hour; and a July 2023 call to a local police-department dispatch number in the Western District of Texas, in which he falsely identified himself as a senior federal law enforcement officer, provided the officer\u2019s residential address to the dispatcher, claimed to have killed his (federal officer\u2019s) mother, and threatened to kill any responding police officers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
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