Said one police chief: 'Someone's going to end up punching one of these clowns in their big red nose.'
A social media threat involving clowns kidnapping students and killing teachers was determined to not be "viable," the head of Easton Area School District security said Friday morning.
"We will be at all high schools this Friday to either kidnapp students or kill teachers going to they cars" someone with the screen name Aint Clownin Around said on Facebook.
The post with the hashtag #WeNotClowninAround was trending Friday.
P'burg schools shelter in place
Easton Director of Safe Schools John Remaley said the threat has been linked to Grove City, Ohio, but has been felt in Oklahoma, Texas, Arkansas and Alabama, among other places.
Phillipsburg schools went into shelter in place on Friday morning after the district developed information about "suspicious activity" and turned it over to police.
Mayor Stephen Ellis said a construction worker at the middle school had heard of a post spreading around social media that a clown with a gun would come to the school. The construction worker told a teacher, who went to security, Ellis said. It was not clear if the online posting specifically mentioned the school.
Easton did not take any specific action Friday, other than to alert staff to the threat, Remaley said. There have been a few clown spottings reported by students in recent days, but police following up have found nothing, he said.
Easton security personnel will take precautions during afternoon dismissal, but Remaley wouldn't go into detail because it involves security planning.
"We looked at it," Remaley said, but there was nothing to indicate "it was a viable threat."
Bethlehem police have also taken notice of the social media posting, police Chief Mark DiLuzio said. School resource officers stationed at the Bethlehem Area middle and high schools in the city are aware of it, but no additional police presence is planned for Friday, he said.
Errors in the post in spelling -- "kidnapp" -- and grammar -- "they cars" -- make DiLuzio wonder about the age group responsible for the posting, he said.
"There is the threat of violence," DiLuzio said. "There's a ton of threats of violence on the Internet every day. The Internet, to me, it started as a great idea but it turned into a garbage dump, a digital garbage dump."
Clown prank lands teen in hot water
Bethlehem has not been immune to the clown phenomenon that popped up as of late. Wednesday morning, children at a school bus stop near the Lynfield public housing development on South Side reported seeing a man in brown pants with a clown face and red nose walking through nearby woods.
"The kids and their parents got scared about it," the police chief said.
Officers checked the area but found nothing suspicious.
DiLuzio wondered whether the uptick in clown sightings has to do with something in pop culture, such as the remake of Steven King's killer-clown tale, "It." The producer told Hollywood Reporter last week the activity reported around the United States is not a marketing tie-in.
In any case, DiLuzio cautions against donning a clown outfit and trying to scare children in a playground or outside a school, for example.
"What could occur is that a parent may interrupt the meeting and become physical with the clown if a clown scares a bunch of kids in a playground," he said. "As a parent myself, I would be very upset and I would go over.
"Someone's going to end up punching one of these clowns in their big red nose. ... Who could blame them?"
Tony Rhodin may be reached at arhodin@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow him on Twitter @TonyRhodin. Find lehighvalleylive.com on Facebook.