On Jan. 25, as Del. Wendell Walker, R-Lynchburg, stepped to the microphone on the floor of the House Chamber in Richmond to speak to House Bill 1572, Lynchburg’s E.C. Glass High School was being held on a lockdown following a bomb threat made toward the school.
On May 4, Walker’s bill came full circle, as Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin stood in the same place where the multi-hour lockdown was being held, this time a far more celebratory occasion for city and school leadership, as Youngkin ceremonially signed HB 1572 into law, strengthening the penalties for calling in false threats to law enforcement.
“Let me be clear, this is not a prank. This is a crime. And this bill treats it appropriately,” Youngkin said of Walker’s sponsored HB 1572, which he said Thursday “puts a lot of teeth” on the penalties for phoning in false threats to law enforcement — otherwise known as “swatting.”
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Swatting is the act of making a hoax communication to 911, or even to a private citizen who then communicates the false information to 911, regarding a threat to human life with the intent to draw law enforcement response, which could potentially involve a SWAT team — hence the name.
Walker’s bill updates language in the state code to say, “Any person who knowingly reports, or causes another to report in reliance on intentionally false information provided by such person, a false emergency communication to any emergency personnel that results in an emergency response is guilty of a Class 1 misdemeanor.”
A Class 1 misdemeanor in Virginia is punishable by up to 12 months in jail and a fine of up to $2,500.
The bill also states any person who makes such a threat that results in any person suffering “serious bodily injury” would be guilty of a Class 6 felony, and any threat resulting in death would be punishable as a Class 5 felony.
A Class 6 felony carries one to five years in prison and up to $2,500 in fines, while a Class 5 felony carries prison time of one to 10 years and up to $2,500 in fines.
Other examples of swatting calls in Lynchburg include the September 2022 lockdown at E.C. Glass, where a threat was phoned in from outside of the state against the school resulting in an hours long lockdown, or in early April, when a false bomb threat was made toward Lynchburg City Hall ahead of a scheduled public hearing on the real estate tax rate.
Walker said Thursday he was unaware of how big of a concern swatting calls were in the area until Lynchburg Police Chief Ryan Zuidema approached him about it ahead of the 2023 General Assembly session, and it only got bigger when he got to Richmond.
“Once we got to Richmond and started working with other legislators and other law enforcement agencies ... they came to me and said, ‘Mr. Walker, do you have any idea how many bomb threats are called in each year in the Commonwealth of Virginia?’ ... it was shocking,” Walker said.
Walker, in touting the bill’s support from both parties — 92-6 in the House and 40-0 in the Senate — said, “This is not a bipartisan bill; this is a public safety bill.”
On Thursday, Youngkin thanked Walker for “listening to the people that elected you to serve,” adding the bill “works to keep students safe, works to keep first responders safe, keep law enforcement safe and [does] something that needed to be done.”
“These false claims of emergency are just wrong. They’re wrong,” Youngkin said.
Zuidema and Lynchburg City Schools’ Superintendent Crystal Edwards spoke to the strain that swatting puts on not only law enforcement, but those in the school buildings as well.
“Even though someone will say that this was a prank, and no one got hurt, harm was done,” Edwards said. “We lost valuable instruction time that day. ... We take these matters seriously. We are grateful for the signing of this bill.”
Zuidema said the swatting incidents don’t just affect the officers and deputies responding to that scene, they also jeopardize public safety for residents all over.
“We make sure we divert as many resources as we can here to the school when we have those incidents, but the downside of that is we don’t stop getting 911 calls during those times,” Zuidema said.
“Now, our response to those other emergencies is significantly delayed because of the number of resources we have to bring. That absolutely could cost someone their lives.”
The swatting calls were such a priority for local law enforcement that the item ended up on the city’s 2023 legislative agenda.
“Across the board,” Walker said, “everybody recognized this was an issue that needed to be dealt with.”
Youngkin said this bill was “one of the many” steps Virginia is “taking together” to make the commonwealth safer.
“It takes a coalition, it takes a partnership to get these things done,” he said, referring to the time spent between local law enforcement and state legislators to address the swatting issue.
“And I am so proud of the work that has gone in to making this bill a reality.”
