Teenager George Duke-Cohan jailed for making hoax bomb threats to hundreds of UK schools

Hoaxer sent hundreds of warnings to schools before calling in fake report of airline hijacking to US police

A teenager has been jailed after sending bomb threats to hundreds of schools across the UK and sparking an airport security scare.

George Duke-Cohan targeted 1,700 British schools with hoax emails about explosives before calling in a fake report about an aeroplane hijacking while under surveillance.

The 19-year-old, of Watford, pleaded guilty in September to three counts of making hoax bomb threats and was jailed for three years at Luton Crown Court on Friday.

Handing down the sentence, Judge Richard Foster told Duke-Cohan: “You knew exactly what you were doing and why you were doing it, and you knew full well the havoc that would follow.

“You were playing a cat-and-mouse game with the authorities. You were playing a game for your own perverted sense of fun in full knowledge of the consequences.

“The scale of what you did was enormous. Schools were evacuated and, where they were not, those in charge had to take agonising decisions.”

The court heard how Duke-Cohan had first created a nationwide panic in March 2018, sending emails en masse to schools across the country claiming explosives had been planted on their grounds.

His hoax led to more than 400 schools being evacuated, the National Crime Agency (NCA) said.

Messages, sent to a variety of schools including those that cater for children with special educational needs, threatened to set off an explosive device if payment was not made.

“This is a message to everyone. We’ve sent in a student with a bomb,” one email said.

“The bomb is set to go off in three hours’ time. If you do not send 5,000 dollars USD to paymentsveltpvp.com. If you do not send the money, we will blow up the device.

“If you try to call the cops we will blow up the device on the spot. Any attempt at defusing it yourself will cause it to explode.”

NCA officers were able to apprehend Duke-Cohan days after the incident, but not before he sent a second round of emails warning schools in the UK and the US about a pipe bomb threat.

The teenager was released on bail on the condition he did not use electronic devices, but refused to desist with his wave of hoaxes.

Before long, he had called police officials at San Francisco Airport to tell them his daughter was on board a hijacked plane flying between California and the UK.

Speaking to an operator, he identified himself at “Mike Sanchez”, claiming his daughter had phoned him from on board the plane in a “distressed state”.

The incident led to him being arrested for a third time at his Hertfordshire home on 31 August.

“The passengers and crew on that flight must have been terrified when their plane was taken to a quarantined area, and, apart from the financial cost, the onward travelling plans and connecting flights would have been in disarray,” the judge told Duke-Cohan.

The teenager was sentenced to one year for the emails sent to schools and two years for the airport security scare.

The judge said that, for the purposes of sentencing, he accepted that Duke-Cohan has autism spectrum disorder.

Additional reporting by PA