An Oregon man was arrested Tuesday morning for allegedly targeting Jewish hospitals and care centers in New York City and Long Island with fake bomb threats, according to prosecutors.
Between May and September 2021, Domagoj Patkovic, 31, made at least six phone calls to Jewish hospitals in Queens and Nassau County, as well as a care center network with locations in Manhattan, Brooklyn and Queens, according to an indictment filed in the Eastern District of New York.
Under several aliases, the Portland resident told medical staff he had planted bombs or backpacks with C-4 explosives around the facilities and threatened to detonate them.
Patkovic used anti-semitic slurs while making the violent threats, according to an indictment. He live-streamed his calls on platforms like Discord.
On several occasions, local police conducted bomb sweeps in response to hospital notifications, the indictment said. One hospital in Long Island entered a lockdown and was partly evacuated due to a September 2021 threat.
No explosives were ever recovered.
“The defendant and his co-conspirators, motivated by their hatred of Jewish people, targeted Jewish hospitals and care centers … needlessly endangering patients and staff by creating chaos and alarm,” U.S. Attorney Breon Peace said in a statement. “Our highest priority is ensuring all members of our community are protected and we will use all resources possible to prosecute dangerous bomb threats and swatting schemes to the fullest extent of the law.”
Patkovic is being charged with multiple counts of conspiring to make and making threats about explosives, conspiring to transmit and transmitting threatening communications, and conveying false information about explosives. If found guilty, he faces up to 155 years in prison.
Information on a possible attorney for him wasn’t immediately available.
