New York man jailed for hoax bomb calls to London venues

A man has been jailed for a year after making a series of bomb hoax calls from New York to hospitals and other venues in London and across the UK.

David Hart, 22, from West Winfield, New York, made 95 calls to UK numbers between late October and mid-November 2023, including 66 to London numbers.

In November 2025, the United States District Court for the Northern District of New York sentenced him to 12 months in prison and two years of supervised release.

Seven hospitals – including Guy’s and St Thomas’ – were targeted, along with six bars, restaurants and supermarkets, two police control rooms and a cancer support centre.

Hart also tried to call Westminster Abbey, but the calls went unanswered because it was night time in the UK.

The Metropolitan Police said that while not all calls connected, “a significant number” did.

During the conversations, Hart would usually claim he had planted a bomb at the location, and said it would soon explode.

On one occasion, he told a recipient: “I put a bomb in your guys’ corridor bathroom” and warned they had “about 12 seconds to get out of that building”.

Police described the calls as “sustained and persistent”, sometimes lasting almost half an hour, adding that Hart often made multiple calls to the same victims.

Some recipients were sceptical but still responded and took precautions expected in such circumstances.

Venues were searched, and one hospital went into full lockdown while checks for explosives were carried out.

In a video shared by the Met Police, Hart claimed he “made a lot of prank calls” but nothing “threatening”.