PA Campus Shooter Hoaxes Perpetrated By 'Purgatory' Online Group, Report Says

VILLANOVA, PA — A new report from Wired claims to have identified those responsible for the two active shooter hoaxes at Villanova University.

Wired reports the hoaxes were committed by a person who goes by "Gores" online. Gores is the self-proclaimed leader of a group called "Purgatory," an ironic name considering Villanova being a Catholic institution.

Purgatory, according to Wired, will call in hoax threats to schools, like the hoaxes reported at Villanova on Thursday and Sunday, for just $20.

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The report says the group has celebrated the media attention these hoaxes have generated.

Federal authorities earlier this year secured guilty pleas to three men tied to Purgatory. Owen Jarboe, 19, of Hagerstown, Maryland; Evan Strauss, 27, of Moneta, Virginia; and Brayden Grace, 19, of Columbus, Ohio pleaded guilty to conspiracy, cyberstalking, interstate threatening communications, and threats to damage or destroy by means of fire and explosives.

Prosecutors said the three made hoax threats toward a Delaware high school, an Alabama trailer park, Albany International Airport in New York, and a casino in Ohio, among other incidents.

The first active shooter hoax at Villanova happened at about 4:50 p.m. Thursday during move-in activities.

Radnor Township Police issued an alert regarding a report of an active shooter on the school's campus, urging students and residents to shelter in place.

An orientation event was scheduled for Thursday night.

>>>Active Shooter At Villanova University A 'Cruel' Hoax in Photos<<<

From about 4:50 p.m. to 6:30 p.m., the university community and neighbors on the Main Line feared the community was the victim of a mass shooting.

According to Delaware County officials, the Department of Emergency Services got a call at 4:33 p.m. of shots fired from a man armed with an AR-15-style weapon on Villanova's campus. Shortly thereafter, Villanova's Department of Public Safety got an anonymous report of an active shooter in the Charles Widger School of Law.

Multiple calls featured gunshot-like sounds in the background, authorities said. These calls are under investigation, according to county officials.

At 5:06 p.m., first responders got a report of a gunshot wound, which out to be unfounded, officials said.

Ultimately, no one was hurt and there never was a shooter.

After a campus search, officials confirmed the active shooter report as a hoax, that there was no firearm on campus, and that no injuries resulted from a shooting.

Villanova University President Rev. Peter M. Donohue called Thursday's incident a "cruel hoax," and during a blessing at the fall 2025 orientation event said the victims of the hoax were no longer strangers, bonded by a traumatic event.

"You may be sitting next to a stranger," he said to the crowd of students. "Because of this event today, we are not strangers anymore."

The incident drew local, county, state, and federal law enforcement to the Catholic university's campus.

But the sense of peace was short-lived, as the second hoax report of an active shooter came in Sunday morning.

Radnor Police officers were at Villanova's Austin Hall late in the morning after the school got a call about a possible threat.

Officials quickly identified this report as false, preventing large-scale panic among the school and the surrounding communities.

Sunday's events on Villanova's campus featured increased police presence due to the troubling hoaxes.

"I do not know why this is happening, but I assure you the authorities are working tirelessly to find out who is behind these calls," Donohue said in a letter to the community Sunday.

Federal, state and local authorities are investigating both incidents.