Pennsylvania Teacher Gets Prison for Terror Threats

(Bucks County, Pennsylvania) In June 2008, a 46-year-old teacher at Longstreth Elementary School, Susan Romanyszyn, was convicted by a jury of making terroristic threats against the school in October 2007.

The threats, childishly scrawled, threatening and scattered throughout the school, terrified teachers, parents and children for weeks.

"I have weapons and nife," said one message, decorated with a stick figure shooting five other stick figures, that was found in a classroom. "Die today kill 'em all."

Other threats were written on walls, and a fifth-grade girl found a fake bomb inside her desk. The jury convicted Romanyszyn of planting 11 of the 17 threats found between Oct. 11 and Oct. 19, 2007.

Last week, Romanyszyn was sentenced to one to two years in prison followed by 20 years of probation.

The only motive prosecutors offered was that she was miffed over not getting a fifth-grade assignment.

"Does it make sense? No. I don't think that makes sense to 99 percent of the community," said Gary Gambardella, who prosecuted the case. "She's nuts. She's a danger. She's not balanced."

Boylan said a court-ordered psychological report on Romanyszyn was "not particularly helpful" in explaining the crime. The judge ordered psychiatric counseling during her sentence.

Romanyszyn was taken to the county prison for processing and then taken home. Due to ill health and weakness from cancer treatments, she will only be required to go to prison if she improves.