Prosecutor: Boy, 16, Made Hackensack, Paramus School Bomb Threats

A 16-year-old boy called in several bogus threats of bombs at schools in Hackensack and Paramus last week, said authorities who took him into custody.

The Bergen County Public Safety Operations Center in Mahwah
Photo Credit: *BCPSOC*

Jerry DeMarco

03/02/2020 5:31 p.m.

The boy blocked his caller ID to place six calls to several area police apartments last Thursday and Friday, Bergen County Prosecutor Mark Musella said.

The bogus theats brought Paramus and Hackensack police and firefighters, a Bergen County Regional SWAT team and the Bergen County Sheriff’s Bomb Squad to the sites, he said.

It didn’t take long for Musella’s Cyber Crimes Unit to identify the caller, the prosecutor said.

They took the boy into protective custody on Friday and signed a delinquency complaint charging him with three counts each of causing a false public alarm and making terroristic threats.

Then they sent him to the Bergen County Juvenile Detention Center in Teterboro pending action by the Family Part of Superior Court in Hackensack.

Musella thanked Bergen County Sheriff Anthony Cureton, the Bergen County Regional SWAT team, the Bergen County Public Safety Operations Center in Mahwah, Elmwood Park police, and the Paramus and Hackensack police and fire departments.

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