A bomb threat from an anonymous sender via email startled the UCA Office of Admissions on March 13.

The threat was sent to over 300 other universities with the subject line “My manifesto” and said, “Four fertilizer-based explosives. Two around campus (one is buried), one in my car, and one on me. As soon as I detonate the first three, it’s guns blazing. If law enforcement manages to trap me then the fourth one on me goes kaboom. I’m hoping for a high kill count today!”

Vice President of Information Technology, Trevor Seifert, said in the UCAPD report that the email was associated with the dark web. 

Assistant Director of Campus Preview Days, Sydney Jones initially opened the email at 8:50 a.m. and then alerted Director of Admissions, Ashley Berry, who forwarded the email to Chief John Merguie at UCAPD, the report said. 

Deputy Chief of Police, Christopher Bentley along with Sgt. Kevin Ford and Lt. Michael Shaw investigated the campus to find any evidence of excavation and burial of a bomb but found no signs of a recent burial.

Berry said, “We immediately knew this needed to be reported to our police department, so we alerted them. I was contacted straight away by our chief of police who informed me of the necessary steps they would be taking, but not to be alarmed.

“With the help of our police department and our IT division, we were informed that this was not a threat. I’m thankful for the immediate responses from multiple departments on campus and their diligence of keeping our campus safe,” he said.

Seifert said, “For this particular case we just looked to ensure there were no other forms of the threat sent to campus that the police department would need to know about. And there were not.”

The last time UCA received a bomb threat was on July 27, 2022. After the threat was called in over the phone, UCAPD evacuated the Math and Computer Science building and Integrated Health Sciences building and the Conway Bomb Squad arrived and cleared the buildings; however, no bomb was found. 

Sgt. Michael Hopper said, “Each case is different, but generally speaking the officer in charge will evaluate the threat based on the information provided, referencing the Department of Homeland Security’s bomb threat checklist.

“A decision is then made to evacuate or not.  A building’s administrator, or higher executive, has the right to order an evacuation whenever he or she fears safety is an issue, even before police personnel arrive on scene,” he said.

Hopper said the last threat “contained more specific information relating to campus buildings, though it was still relatively vague.”

Hopper said UCAPD forwarded the case to the FBI and there were no new leads.