Bomb threat brings charge

A 16-year-old St. Charles boy was charged with a felony Friday in connection with threats scrawled on a school wall.

The St. Charles East High School student is accused of writing on two bathroom walls that bombs had been planted in the school Tuesday.

District Superintendent Don Schlomann said he would recommend expulsion of the student to the school board.

"This should serve as a reminder to anyone in the future contemplating doing something like this that there are repercussions," St. Charles Police Chief Jim Lamkin said at a news conference Friday.

Police and school officials said the threat was investigated Tuesday and was deemed not credible. Sweeps of the building came up with nothing.

Lamkin wouldn't comment on a motive.

After a similar threat was found scrawled in a bathroom at North last month, the district set up a tip line and $2,000 reward for information leading to the identity of such vandals.

District and police officials received multiple tips, including one that led to the student accused in the East threat, Schlomann said.

The tipster will get the $2,000 reward -- half from the district and half offered by the district's insurance agent, Brian Feltes.

Threats in area schools have been increasingly common, even at the elementary school level. Administrators have expressed frustration at what at some times seems to be an attempt to get extra time off school.

"We really hope this is a deterrent," Schlomann said. "That's our biggest issue."

The student was being held at the Kane County Juvenile Justice Center Friday after being charged with a felony charge of disorderly conduct. He could face penalties ranging from probation to five years in a juvenile detention facility, Lamkin said.