A former U.S. president and several members of Congress were targets of a plot carried out by two European men to intimidate and threaten dozens of people by calling in bogus reports of police emergencies at their homes, according to court records unsealed on Wednesday.
Thomasz Szabo, 26, of Romania, and Nemanja Radovanovic, 21, of Serbia, targeted roughly 100 people with “swatting” calls to instigate an aggressive response by police officers at the victims’ homes, a federal indictment alleges.
A U.S. Secret Service agent’s affidavit doesn’t name the former U.S. president or any other officials identified as victims of the hoax calls.
The two defendants are not explicitly charged in the indictment with threatening a former president, but one of the alleged victims is identified as a “former elected official from the executive branch” who was swatted on Jan. 9. 2024. Radovanovic falsely reported a killing and threatened to set off an explosion at that person’s home, the indictment says.
Szabo told Radovanovic that they should pick targets from both the Republican and Democratic parties because “we are not on any side,” the indictment says.
“While some of these calls targeted private citizens chosen seemingly at random, most of the calls targeted public officials, family members of public officials, and other prominent individuals,” the agent wrote.
The calls also included threats to carry out mass shootings at New York City synagogues and to set off explosives at the U.S. Capitol and a university, the indictment said. A federal grand jury in Washington, D.C., handed up the indictment last Thursday.
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Online court records in Washington didn’t say if Szabo or Radovanovic have been arrested or if they are represented by attorneys. A court filing accompanying their indictment said investigators believed they were in separate foreign countries last week. A spokesperson for Graves’ office declined to elaborate.
Secret Service agents questioned Szabo in Romania in January. He told them that he has been involved in both swatting and bomb threats since late 2020, the affidavit says.
Agents questioned Radovanovic in Serbia in February. He recited the elements of a “script” that he used during his swatting calls, according to the affidavit. It says Radovanovic claimed to be acting at the direction of a juvenile who provided him with victims’ addresses.
Szabo and Radovanovic are both charged with conspiracy and more than two dozen counts of making threats. The plot spanned more than three years, from December 2020 through January 2024, according to prosecutors.
“Swatting is not a victimless prank — it endangers real people, wastes precious police resources, and inflicts significant emotional trauma,” Matthew Graves, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, said in a statement.
Szabo organized and moderated chat groups to coordinate swatting attacks against 40 private citizens and 61 officials, including cabinet-level members of the federal government’s executive branch, the head of a federal law enforcement agency, a federal judge, current and former governors and other state officials, the indictment said.
In January 2021, three days before President Joe Biden’s inauguration, Szabo called a crisis intervention hotline and threatened to detonate explosives at the Capitol and kill the president-elect, according to the indictment.
In December 2023 and January 2024, Radovanovic allegedly called government agencies to falsely report killings and imminent suicides or kidnappings at the homes of U.S. senators, House members and elected state officials, according to the indictment. One of the calls led to a car crash involving injuries, the indictment alleges.
The FBI reported a surge in swatting calls in late 2023 and early 2024, with some of the targets linked to court cases against former President Donald Trump. A fake emergency call reported a shooting at the home of U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan, who is overseeing Trump’s election subversion case in Washington. Justice Department special counsel Jack Smith also was the subject of a fake emergency call on Christmas Day of 2023.
Georgia state Sen. John Albers, a Republican whose home was swatted in the Atlanta suburb of Roswell, said he expects the U.S. to seek extradition of both men to stand trial.
“This will be a very strong signal to other people, whether they are at home or abroad, that we will find you and we will hunt you down,” Albers told The Associated Press.
Georgia state Sen. Clint Dixon, a Republican whose Buford home was targeted by swatting calls on Christmas and Dec. 26 of last year, said he felt “a sense of relief” and his wife was “elated” after the Secret Service told him the suspects had been identified. Dixon has said that both times, a police tactical team, fire trucks and an ambulance responded.
“What happened to me and my family was very scary for my wife and my children,” Dixon said. “It could have been a very dangerous situation.”
—Associated Press writer Jeff Amy in Atlanta contributed to this report.
© 2024 The Canadian Press