Police: Country Club of the South hoax was case of "swatting"

JOHNS CREEK, Ga. — Johns Creek leaders had strong words Friday for the person who called 911 to report a hoax triple shooting and hostage situation.

Thursday, police said the person called Alpharetta 911 to report they had shot a man, woman and child, and were holding a woman hostage.

An incident report said the suspect demanded $30,000 in ransom money.  When police arrived to the Carlisle Lane home inside the Country Club of the South, they found 5 people surprised people, including children, inside the home.

Police believe the prankster was “SWATting” police, a practice in which a person uses Voiceover Internet Protocol (IP) to disguise the source of the call  to cause alarm and to send police to an unwitting residence on an emergency call.

“It’s dangerous.  It’s stupid.  I hope the person who did it gets caught,” said Mayor Mike Bodker.  “SWATting is deadly serious and it’s stupid, period.”

Bodker said the call sent 20 police officers, 15 of whom were heavily armed, to the home.  He said the North Fulton SWAT team was also enroute to the home.

“This was a powder keg waiting to explode,” Bodker said of the situation.

Bodker said the city was still tallying up the cost associated with the show of force, but he was hopeful the person who made the call would be on the hook for it if caught.

WSB-AM radio talk show host Erick Erickson knows what it’s like to be the victim of “SWATing.”  Two years ago, someone called 911 posing as him to say he’d shot his wife.  The call sent police scrambling to his Macon home.

“If it keeps up, someone's going to get killed,” he told us. “That's why they're doing it, to try to get someone killed."

WSBTV