A Crawfordsville man is facing a felony charge of false reporting after he reportedly called in a courthouse bomb threat because 911 dispatchers “did not seem to take it seriously.”
Matthew M. Stark, 35, was charged in Montgomery County Superior Court 1 with false reporting, a level 6 felony.
Court documents show that on July 14 officials with the Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office were made aware of an alleged threatening voicemail that was left with the Montgomery County Clerk’s Office. The voicemail advised that the “courthouse is going to explode sometime today. There’s a bomb inside. I’m just reporting it.”
As a result, the courthouse was evacuated. Explosive detection K-9 units from Purdue University checked and later cleared the building.
Court documents further show the number the voicemail reportedly came from was found to be a TextNow customer, which investigators used to link to Stark. Officials said that Stark was linked to a home in Crawfordsville using information from TextNow, as well as an IP address.
On July 15, law enforcement met with Stark at his home in the 800 block of East Elmore Street. During an interview Stark told law enforcement that he did not know if the “courthouse was really safe.”
Stark claimed he saw a man handcuffed to a seat “for a long time, where there were several explosives wired up everywhere.” The documents said that Stark told officers he also heard radio traffic which said there could be a bomb in the bottom of the courthouse.
When asked why Stark called the clerk’s office instead of 911, the documents stated that Stark told law enforcement that “911 did not seem to take it seriously.”
Stark’s initial hearing occurred Monday afternoon, where he asked for a public defender. A jury trial is slated for Nov. 17.
