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Sixth Bomb Threat at WIU, Reward Increases, President Posts YouTube Video
It can simply be said like this: not again.
Western Illinois University has been hit with yet another bomb threat -- the sixth in about three weeks, and the fifth in about a week's time.
University officials say a threat was found around 11:20pm Thursday at Higgins Hall in the form of a note -- the second such bomb threat via note, after several have been reported to other dorms by phone.
The threat was phony, and officials say residents were let back into their dorms after about an hour.
The threat came on the same day that Western held a town hall meeting addressing the threats, and after University President Al Goldfarb posted a video on YouTube trying to calm the public's concerns.
"I want to reassure the campus community that we are taking all steps possible to deal with the current bomb threat situation," Goldfarb said in the video. "It is very clear that someone is trying to disrupt our lives at Western, and we want to make certain that we capture this individual as soon as possible. We're working with State Police authorities; the FBI is on campus [Thursday]. We will continue to work very dilligently to make sure that this individual is captured."
The university says the FBI has provided additional resources to investigate the threats, and that reward money from Western's "Stop the Threat" Fund has grown to $10,000, for information leading to the arrest of whoever is making the threats, along with a $1,000 reward from the Macomb-area CrimeStoppers.
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