Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Breaking News

JCC Bomb Threat Suspect Is Denied Bail

(JTA) — The St. Louis man accused of making at least eight bomb threats against Jewish community centers and the Anti-Defamation League must remain in jail until his trial, a federal judge in that city ruled.

The allegations against Juan Thompson, 32, are “very serious,” U.S. District Court Judge David Noce said Monday, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported. Noce said that allowing Thompson to post bail and leave jail would “not reasonably assure the court that he will not endanger the safety of any other person or the community.”

Thompson, who was arrested March 3, has been charged with cyberstalking, which carries a maximum sentence of five years in prison. He has no previous criminal record. He made some of the threats in the name of a former romantic partner he had been cyberstalking, according to the U.S. Attorney of Southern New York.

Thompson’s public defender at a hearing last week had requested house arrest and GPS monitoring.

More than 150 threats have been received by JCCs, Jewish schools and other Jewish institutions since the beginning of the year, according to the Secure Community Network, which coordinates security across Jewish organizations in North America.

A message from our Publisher & CEO Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

We’ve set a goal to raise $260,000 by December 31. That’s an ambitious goal, but one that will give us the resources we need to invest in the high quality news, opinion, analysis and cultural coverage that isn’t available anywhere else.

If you feel inspired to make an impact, now is the time to give something back. Join us as a member at your most generous level.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

With your support, we’ll be ready for whatever 2025 brings.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.