Briton jailed for threatening to kill 200 people in US

A 24-year-old Briton who threatened to kill 200 people in the US, in posts he made under a false name on a social networking website, has been jailed for more than two years.

Reece Elliott, of Foss Way, South Shields, made the threat in February on online memorial pages for two girls from Tennessee who died in car accidents, BBC reported Tuesday.

About 3,000 pupils in Warren County in the US state of Ohio missed school the next day as a result.

Elliott, who pleaded guilty at a court in Newcastle in April, was jailed for two years and four months.

The man admitted making a threat to kill and of sending grossly offensive messages. He had been held in custody since his arrest.

Elliott targeted a tribute page to 17-year-old Caitlin Talley, a pupil at Warren County High, who died in a car accident in October 2012.

He also posted comments on the tribute site of a 15-year-old girl who was not named.

Using a false name, he wrote on the RIP Caitlin Talley page: "My father has three guns. I'm planning on killing him first and putting him in a dumpster."

"Then I'm taking the motor and I'm going in fast. I'm gonna kill hopefully at least 200 before I kill myself. So you want to tell the deputy, I'm on my way."

"I'm killing 200 people minimum at school. I will be on CNN," BBC quoted the man as writing.

Two months before Elliott posted the threats, 20 children and six adults were shot and killed at Sandy Hook elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut.

After the posts were found to have originated in Britain, US officials contacted the Metropolitan Police.