Teen sentenced to 48 months in prison in nationwide swatting spree

A California teenager was sentenced to 48 months in prison on Tuesday following a series of interstate threats to injure individuals across the country. 

Alan W. Filion, 18, of Lancaster, Calif., made more than 375 swatting and threat calls to authorities in which he claimed to have planted bombs, threatened to detonate bombs or conduct mass shootings at those locations between August 2022 and January 2024, according to the plea agreement. 

He is said to have targeted religious institutions, high schools, colleges and universities, as well as government officials and numerous individuals across the U.S.

Filion said some of the calls were self-motivated and that he was paid for other instances, according to the Department of Justice.

The teenager was arrested in California on Florida state charges in late January following a May 2023 threat he made to a religious institution in Sanford, Fla., where he claimed to have an illegally modified AR-15, a Glock 17 pistol, pipe bombs and Molotov cocktails. 

Filion said that he was going to imminently “commit a mass shooting” and “kill everyone” he saw. He pleaded guilty in federal court to making that threat.

He’s pleaded guilty to several other similar crimes in Washington, Texas and Florida.