Tingler found guilty on four of five counts
Charles Tingler was found guilty on four of five counts for making bomb threats and threatening to bring a gun to a school.
Tingler will be sentenced by Ottawa County Common Pleas Court Judge Bruce Winters at 3 p.m. May 13.
A jury of eight women and four men found Tingler guilty on two counts of inducing panic after he called a bomb threat to Oak Harbor High School and Middle School and Waite High School in Toledo last April. The threats forced Waite High School to delay the start of school and Oak Harbor locked down the schools.
Tingler was also found guilty of disrupting public services for the Waite High School calls.
After an investigation, Ottawa County Drug Task Force Detective Don St. Clair said Tingler used a phone application called SpoofCard to conceal his voice and identity. Tingler admitted to detectives that he made the calls.
"I did take it too far. Was just trying to have fun. I was not being serious. I take full responsibility," Tingler said to Clair and Ottawa County Sheriff' Detective Joel Barton during an interview at his home in April 2014.
Amanda Krzystan, Tingler's attorney, argued the calls were made with no malicious intent and all calls made to schools were a joke.
"He was prodded and poked by friends to make calls as a joke," Krzystan said during her defense.
Assistant prosecutor Joe Gerber said no evidence was offered by the defense that friends forced Tingler to make calls and said the calls were serious whether Tingler was joking or not.
While being interviewed by St. Clair, Tingler said there were no friends with him and that he made the calls because he wanted people to like him on Twitter.
St. Clair said calls were traced to Tingler from the phone application records. He said Tingler's name, email and phone number were on the account along with payment history made towards the application.
Tingler was found guilty on one count aggravating menacing after threatening to bring a gun to Port Clinton Middle School.
Port Clinton Middle School Principal Carrie Sanchez said teachers and administrators were having a professional development day when she answered a phone call admittedly made by Tingler.
"It was an irate parent (calling) about unjustly suspended child," she said. "(He) told me he had enough (of conversation with Sanchez) and would come to the school with a gun."
Sanchez said she felt threatened by the remark and immediately told Port Clinton administration.
Krzystan said the statement made during the phone call never mentioned any harm to her, or anyone at the school. She said Tingler said he had a gun and was going to come to the school.
Tingler was found not guilty on count two, disrupting public services.
Gerber argued his bomb threat disrupted school in Oak Harbor after he made a threat and argued it unnecessarily made law enforcement to respond to a false threat.