Schools closed in different parts of the country after threatening messages

Threatening SMS messages spread in Ostrobothnia

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As with the shootings in Jokela last November, Tuesday's mass murder at a vocational school in Kauhajoki produced a knock-on effect of threats to other educational establishments.
      A number of schools were obliged to close their doors and send pupils home on Thursday.
      Searches of the premises found nothing suspicious.
     
In Kajaani, police apprehended two persons on Thursday morning in connection with threats made.
      Chief Inspector Arto Lumikari of the Kajaani police reported that a young man born in 1980 had threatened to shoot at a school on September 25th.
      The threat came from the Internet and was not directed at any specific school.
      Police were notified of the person making the threats through Europol, the European Union's criminal intelligence agency.
      Another man in his early twenties had told a teacher about explosions and shootings in a Kajaani school.
      Neither of the two men had a firearms licence.
      The school complex in Keuruu in Central Finland
      was emptied on Thursday morning after a bomb threat by a 15-year-old boy.
      Police were also called to investigate threats or rumours of violence in Rauma, Masku, Viitasaari, Porvoo, and Siikajoki.
     
In Kauhajoki and the nearby Seinäjoki area, threatening SMS messages were circulating among youngsters on Thursday.
      The Seinäjoki police set up a local anonymous tip-line, to which around a dozen calls came in about the messages.
      Det. Chief Inspector Urpo Lintala described the tone of the messages as threatening, but said they are still being analysed. Police are unwilling to divulge the actual content, in order to discourage the spread of the phenomenon.
      ”We want to cut these sorts of threats out immediately”, said Lintala.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Jokela shooting sparks more copycat school threats (14.11.2007)

Helsingin Sanomat