It took months of police work, and an investigation that involved a slew of law enforcement agencies, from the Walton village police to the FBI, but it finally happened: An arrest has been made in connection with a series of sadistic Facebook threats made to children in the Walton Central School District.
While the arrest is sure to be welcome news to the community, it did not come soon enough to prevent months of threats, online harassment, police searches at the schools, and -- a final indignity -- the cancellation of the last day of class at the Townsend Elementary School on Thursday.
On Thursday morning, the Walton Village Police Department announced the arrest of 28-year-old Jennifer Morris, an East Branch resident. Morris is charged with one count of falsely reporting an incident in the first degree, a class D felony, and one count of aggravated harassment in the second degree, a misdemeanor. In January, Morris was arrested on a lesser charge of endangering the welfare of a child for making similar threats.
Under New York penal law, the maximum sentence for a class D felony is seven years.
The news of the arrest followed closely on the heels of a fresh threat made on the Walton school. Posted on the Facebook wall of the Walton Reporter on Wednesday, the threat read:
Theres a bomb in the Walton little school and its gunna go off tmo morning.
The district reacted by cancelling school at Townsend Elementary for Thursday, the last day on the school calendar. Walton Central School superintendent George Mack could not be reached immediately for comment.
The charges Morris currently faces are more serious than the misdemeanor charge she was arrested on in January, but at this time, she is not facing separate charges for each of the many threats that have been directed at the Walton school since May. Walton village police chief Brian Laauser said that the investigation is ongoing, and that further charges are likely.
"Last night we had enough to arrest her and get her put in jail," Laauser said. "At this point I'm sure there's going to be additional charges."
Morris was arraigned in Walton village court in front of Justice Michael DiLorenzo, and remanded to the Delaware County Jail in lieu of $10,000 cash bail.
Involved in the investigation, in addition to Walton police, were the Delaware County Sheriff's Office, the Delaware County District Attorney's office, New York State Police troopers and K-9 units, New York City Department of Environmental Protection officers and K-9 units, and the FBI.
With Morris behind bars and facing a felony charge -- and possibly other charges as well -- Laauser said he thinks the community's grueling ordeal is done.
"We're pretty confident that this is over now," he said.
Update, 6/21: On Thursday, Morris's bail was increased from $10,000 cash to $20,000 cash or $40,000 bond, according to a report from WBNG.
The TV station also reports that the Walton Central School District will pursue a civil suit against Morris for the costs associated with beefing up security in response to the threats.
Morris's bail hearing on Thursday afternoon drew dozens of community members, who showed up with signs and petitions to advocate for higher bail for Morris. A petition that was delivered to Delaware County District Attorney Richard Northrup read:
We the undersigned parents and members of the Walton Community respectfully ask that when you are considering the sentence and amount of bail, of one Jennifer L. Morris that you take into full consideration the amount of pain and loss that she has put upon the Town of Walton and beyond. The amount of time that our children have had stolen from them that can never be returned to them, the cost to our community in so many different ways; all of the involved law enforcement as well as additional costs and strains to families with loss of work, extra daycare and such. We hope that your decisions will reflect our many concerns. Thank you for your time.
