Jonathan Trent Patterson, 22, of Belton, Anderson County, South Carolina, United States allegedly faxed a threat against Belton Middle School in Belton at around 8:45 a.m. on May 27, 2022. Police believed the threat to be non-credible.
On June 2, 2022, Patterson was arrested. He was taken into custody and placed in holding for the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
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In a federal complaint, Patterson was charged for electronically transmitting multiple shooting threats relating to several schools in Anderson County. At 2:30 p.m. on July 3, 2022, he will appear before U.S. Magistrate Judge Jacquelyn D. Austin at the Carroll A. Campbell, Jr. U.S. Courthouse.
The FBI and Anderson County Sheriff’s Office deputies are investigating the case. Assistant U.S. attorneys Max Cauthen and Everett E. McMillian are prosecuting the case.
Belton was named after John Belton O’Neal, the first Columbia and Greenville Railroad president. William Lockhart Ball III, 73, the 67th U.S. Secretary of the Navy, and former Major League Baseball player Matthew LeCroy, 46, were both born in the city.
Born in Pendleton, Oregon, USA in 1943, comics artist David Emmett Cockrum died in Belton in 2006. He co-created X-Men characters Nightcrawler, Storm, Colossus, Mystique and Black Cat.
