Boston, Massachusetts Police Clear School Bomb Threats as Unfounded After Morning Responses Across the City

Boston police officers and members of the department's Bomb Squad responded across the city on Tuesday morning to a series of telephone bomb threats against school buildings, and by the end of the response every affected site had been checked, deemed safe and cleared. Sgt. Det. John Boyle, a Boston Police Department spokesperson, said the threats were determined to be unfounded and are being investigated.

WCVB reported that officers were called to at least seven locations: Josiah Quincy Elementary School, Blackstone Elementary School, Samuel Adams Elementary School, Boston Latin Academy, Torit Montessori School, the New England Conservatory and Boston University. The list covers elementary classrooms, a public exam school, a private Montessori school, a music conservatory and a university campus, which sent officers from multiple Boston police districts moving from one address to the next through the morning.

The Boston University alert

Boston University issued an emergency alert at about 9:40 a.m. reporting a large emergency response near 1 University Road, the address of Boston University Academy, the university's high school. The building was evacuated. At 10:15 a.m., the university alerted its community that the incident was a bomb hoax, that there was no threat to the community and that the building would be reoccupied.

"Today, officers from multiple Boston police districts, along with the BPD Bomb Squad, responded to a series of telephone bomb threats against school buildings across the city," Boyle said in a statement carried by local reports. "After thorough investigations, all affected sites have been deemed safe and have been cleared. The threats have been determined to be unfounded and are currently being investigated."

What the school district told families

Boston Public Schools told parents and staff in an email that the calls were bomb threats. "Today, several schools and universities in Boston, including some BPS schools, received phone calls with bomb threats," the district wrote, in a message reported by WCVB. "BPS is working closely with BPS Safety Services and Boston Police to investigate each call."

WCVB reported that the Boston Regional Intelligence Center is now investigating the calls. Police did not announce any arrest in the reports published on Tuesday, and they did not identify who placed the calls. No device was reported found at any of the cleared sites, and the police statement described every threat as unfounded.

For families, the morning followed a familiar pattern for hoax threat days: an alert from the school or the university, an evacuation or a police presence at the door, and then an all clear once officers and the Bomb Squad had worked through the building. On Tuesday, that sequence played out at sites across Boston at the same time, from elementary schools to a university academy, before police closed the response with every location cleared and the investigation handed to the regional intelligence center.