The school killings in Jokela last week appear to have spawned a number of threats against other schools. While they all appear to have been thoughtless pranks, they have still have kept police in different parts of Finland busy.
On Tuesday evening, police detained a 16-year-old boy in Vantaa on suspicion of issuing an unlawful threat concerning the Martinlaakso School. Earlier in the day police had to reassure pupils at the school who were concerned about the appearance of a video on the YouTube website under the name Martsari Massacre.
Police believe that the boy had uploaded the threatening message onto YouTube on Monday concerning the Martinlaakso School in the west of Vantaa.
The trend also appears to have spread to Sweden, where a 16-year-old boy was taken into custody on Tuesday after reportedly threatening his school with an attack.
In Valkeala, in the southeast of Finland, a threat caused three schools to shut their doors at about noon on Tuesday. The 900 pupils of the school compound had to wait for nearly an hour before the all clear was given and the doors were open.
The threat came from a young man who was involved in an incident about a month ago in which he was drunk and fought with pupils in the school playground. The school's doors were locked in that incident as well.
Police in Lappeenranta have detained a young man who had placed a written threat of violence against the upper secondary school of Lauritsala in an article on the Internet. The 18-year-old Lappeenranta resident has admitted to writing the threat.
The National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) learned of the threat on Monday. The message contained references to the Jokela killings, and it was on line very briefly before it was removed.
Espoo police say that two threatening messages aimed at a school in Kirkkonummi came from Ylivieska. Investigators say that the perpetrators were two schoolboys aged 15.
The two have admitted to having sent the messages, saying that they did so out of a lack of consideration. They said that they chose the community and the school at random.
In the Swedish capital Stockholm a 16-year-old schoolboy was remanded in custody on Tuesday suspected of making an unlawful threat. The is suspected of having planned an attack on a school in the south of the city.
The boy denied the charges.
Another boy under similar suspicions, was handed over to social welfare authorities on Sunday. He remains a suspect.
The threats were reported by the school's guidance counsellor. The boys had showed pictures from a gun magazine to other pupils, saying that they planned to use such a gun to kill their schoolmates. The boys had been under observation earlier.
