Florida authorities have charged a 15-year-old girl who had attended Riverview High School with serious felony offenses after she created an artificial intelligence-generated hoax to falsely accuse her former boyfriend of planning a mass shooting at the school.
Police determined that the incident began when school administrators received an email on Wednesday containing a screenshot from an Instagram post depicting what appeared to be a mass shooting threat. Initial investigations traced the post to a male student who attended Riverview High School, but law enforcement later identified the hoax as originating with the 15-year-old girl herself. She admitted to sending the false screenshot to school officials.
Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office Chief Communications Officer Amanda Granit stated: “Threatening a school is a felony in Hillsborough County. And it doesn’t matter if it’s a joke, it doesn’t matter if it’s from AI, it doesn’t matter if you’re mad, and it doesn’t matter if you’re trying to pin it on someone else. You’re going to face the consequences.”
The girl was charged with written or electronic threat to conduct a mass shooting or act of terrorism, as well as two additional charges related to the incident. Retired Federal Bureau of Investigation special agent Rich Kolko added: “People sit at home … they think nobody can find them or nobody’s going to bother them. They’re just playing on their computer; it’s no big deal. Well, as this young lady learned and as too many other people have learned, it is a big deal.”
