FBI Arrests North Smithfield Man Over Alleged Threats

NORTH SMITHFIELD, RI — Howard S. Bishop, 38, of North Smithfield was arrested Tuesday after he allegedly threatened to kill or hurt his ex-girlfriend, her parents and three prosecutors in Travis County, Texas, the U.S Attorney's office said Thursday. FBI agents picked him up Tuesday, and a federal judge ordered him to be held in federal custody on Thursday. According to court records, Bishop, who was living in Texas but returned to Rhode Island last September, had been ordered to have no contact with a former girl friend in Texas.

In January 2012 a Texas court found him guilty of violating the no contact order. He was put on two years' probation. Then last December, Texas authorities issued a misdemeanor warrant for his arrest for violating the order.

The ex-girlfriend reportedly went into hiding with the FBI's help. Her parents hired guards to protect their home, and three prosecutors reported they were in fear of their lives. According to the press release from the U.S. Attorney's office, police allege "beginning in November 2016 and continuing until his arrest in Rhode Island on Tuesday, Bishop sent hundreds of harassing and threatening messages via the Internet to his former girlfriend and her family, and to three Travis County, TX, prosecutors involved in the prosecution of Bishop for violating the protective order. All of the individuals expressed extreme fear for their safety."

He was charged with cyberstalking, the U.S. Attorney's office said, and specifically, with "transmitting in interstate commerce communications containing threats to injure another person, and with harass or intimidate another person, using an interactive computer service or electronic communication service, that placed a person in reasonable fear of death or serious bodily injury and caused substantial emotional distress."

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