Nervous teacher phoned in bomb threat so class would be canceled, university says

PITTSBURGH A University of Pittsburgh grad student who was nervous about her ability to teach a class instead made two bomb threats so it would be canceled, campus police said.

Pitt police charged Nancy Bruni, 34, earlier this week with phoning in a threat, and then leaving a note about a bomb in a campus restroom on March 20, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reported Thursday.

According to the newspaper, campus police received a call from a woman who said: "This is kind of strange, but I received a message on my phone that two explosions were going to go off tonight at Posvar, one at 6:30 and again at 7:30."

Police eventually traced the call to her phone and confronted Bruni last week, when she allegedly confessed to making both threats.

Bruni told police she suffers from anxiety, depression and obsessive-compulsive disorder and had stopped taking her medications because her health insurance had recently ended. That anxiety led her to search for a way to cancel the class scheduled from 6:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m., police said in a criminal complaint.

Bruni was angry when campus police didn't alert students after the phone threat, so she left the note saying "Two bombs will be detonated in Posvar hall on March 20th 6:30 p.m. 730," the complaint said. The note corresponded to the 5 p.m. call that referenced bombs going off at 6:30 and 7:30 that evening, police said.

When students found the note, two notified Bruni while one called campus police. When the school again didn't alert students to evacuate, Bruni's students became upset and she used that as an excuse to cancel the "Health and Illness" class herself, police said.

Pitt spokesman John Fedele said police searched the building with a bomb-sniffing dog and explosive detectors, but didn't alert students because the threats were deemed "lower level."

Bruni wasn't arrested, but is being mailed a court summons to appear for a June 12 preliminary hearing.

Online court records don't list an attorney for Bruni, who didn't immediately return a call seeking comment on charges of terroristic threats, and threatening to use a weapon of mass destruction.