BOWLING GREEN, OH (WTOL) – It is a frightening prank that has been making its way around the country. Now, "swatting" is happening in northwest Ohio.
Swatting is when a person makes a prank phone call with the goal of activating a SWAT team.
For some it is a prank call, but police said for people in the neighborhood, and surrounding areas, it is a safety hazard.
The Bowling Green Police Department said it has experienced two cases of swatting since Friday from the same house on Blue Jay Drive. The caller said someone was using a firearm and had a bomb in one of the neighborhood's houses. However, when police arrived they found everything to be normal and called off the SWAT team they initially activated.
Police said this is a very dangerous tactic because it takes officers away from other important duties, which increases the risk for the public. It is also quite costly to activate a SWAT team.
"We make priority for calls such as man with a gun calls, shots fired calls, those types of things, and bomb response calls. Those make priority over traffic crashes and those types of things. So when we talk about diverting those resources, that's a cost to the community," explained Lt. Bradley Biller of the Bowling Green Police Division.
Neighbors said all the recent police activity in the neighborhood was unusual and unsettling.
"It's, it's very disturbing I guess. But at least they're making their presence felt and you kinda feel safe knowing that they're running around doing their job when everybody else is sleeping," said Mike Hanhold, a resident of Bowling Green.
Police are still investigating the situation and do not know yet who made the phone calls.
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