COCONUT CREEK, Fla. — A man is facing multiple felony charges after police said he placed threatening phone calls to “several” preschools in the San Diego area while at a South Florida gym.
Authorities allege that Samer Elhamad, 32, of Miami, was making the calls while at the Planet Fitness at 4291 W. Hillsboro Blvd. in Coconut Creek ― and that city’s police officers arrested him there on Monday after California authorities pinged his calls there.
Investigators said Elhamad, who was born in San Diego, called a preschool in Carlsbad, California and said “he was on his way to the school to shoot people.” Police said he also spoke of “rapists” and “sleeper cells.”
A sergeant with the Carlsbad Police Department eventually identified Elhamad as the caller and traced the caller near the 7100 block of Lyons Road. Coconut Creek police said they found Elhamad’s Toyota Prius parked at the gym.
Police said he gave a fake name, claimed to be from Lebanon and tried to pin the calls on two “homeless” people. They said no one was around Elhamad and he couldn’t provide descriptions of the supposed culprits. An arrest report states that he claimed the two said, “Ya, know, whatever” and later claimed they referenced the recent Islamist attack at Bondi Beach in Sydney.
Authorities said he later referenced “sleeper cells” and “’an Afghan DC guy’ who shot two people” and later said he himself was a “sleeper cell.”
Police said they later found out that Elhamad placed threatening calls to other locations of the same preschool in the San Diego area and had called the San Diego Police Department in late March to lodge a false rape complaint against his father.
They said he called San Diego police “21 times” later that day, threatening to kill officers and dispatchers.
Coconut Creek police arrested Elhamad on charges of false report of a bomb, explosive or weapon and using a two-way communications device in the commission of a felony.
Authorities said he also faces a criminal mischief charge and a count of resisting arrest for damaging a police car mirror while in a scuffle with officers as he was being taken into jail.
As of Wednesday afternoon, he was being held in the Broward County Main Jail on a $77,500 bond. It wasn’t immediately clear whether he would be facing any additional charges in California or at the federal level.
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