Man sentenced for deadly ‘swatting’ scheme over username

MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) – A Tennessee man has been sentenced to five years in prison for his role in an international “swatting” scheme that led to a person’s death.

The Commercial Appeal reports that 20-year-old Shane Sonderman is accused of working with others to force people to hand over desirable social media usernames.

In this case, he provided contact information to a person in Great Britain about Mark Herring, who controlled the Twitter handle Tennessee.

Authorities say the co-conspirator called police claiming to have killed a woman and planted pipe bombs around his house and gave Herring’s home address.

When police responded with weapons drawn, the 60-year-old Herring died of a heart attack.

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