REPUBLIC, Mo. (AP) - In a story Feb. 23 about a teenager accused of threatening a school in Missouri, The Associated Press erroneously reported in a headline that the threat was inspired by the book “American Sniper.” Police seized a copy of the book during a search but haven’t said whether the book inspired the threat.
A corrected version of the headline is below:
Police seize guns, books from teen accused in school threat
Police have seized five guns and two books from a 13-year-old boy officers allege had threatened a school shooting outside Springfield
REPUBLIC, Mo. (AP) - Police have seized five guns and two books from a 13-year-old boy officers allege had threatened a school shooting outside Springfield.
The Springfield News-Leader reports that police arrested an unidentified teenager in the Friday threat, alleging the boy said on social media that he would shoot up a Republic school with an AK-47.
A search warrant authorized police to seize “any writings, documents, journals” that could contain “data, writings or searches” associated with making a terrorist threat.
Court documents say the seized books were “American Sniper” and “The Darkest Path.” The former is about a soldier who recorded the most career sniper kills in U.S. military history. The latter is a fiction book about an ex-child soldier living in what the author’s website says is the “Second American Civil War.”
The boy’s attorney says the case has been exaggerated.
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