{"id":193915,"date":"2026-05-16T02:27:11","date_gmt":"2026-05-16T02:27:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/193915\/"},"modified":"2026-05-16T02:27:11","modified_gmt":"2026-05-16T02:27:11","slug":"pennsylvania-state-police-to-create-political-violence-threat-unit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/193915\/","title":{"rendered":"Pennsylvania State Police to create political violence threat unit"},"content":{"rendered":"

(WHTM) \u2014 The acting Pennsylvania State Police commissioner said the agency will change how it handles threats against lawmakers after several said it took them weeks<\/a> to learn they\u2019d been named on a hit list.<\/p>\n

Lt. Col. George Bivens said a review found a breakdown in communication as PSP investigated Adam G. Berryhill, a Lebanon County man now charged with making terroristic threats for posts targeting 20 Democratic state lawmakers. That error prevented Capitol Police and the Sergeant-at-Arms, both tasked with protecting lawmakers, from receiving updated information as the investigation uncovered more details.<\/p>\n

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Democratic and Republican leaders unified in recent days in calling for a better process<\/a> to handle threats. In a letter<\/a> to House and Senate leadership on Wednesday, Bivens said they will get one.<\/p>\n

He announced the creation of a political violence threat unit within PSP\u2019s Bureau of Criminal Investigation. The unit will focus solely on investigating threats against elected officials. Members of the unit will work with PSP\u2019s Tactical Intelligence Unit investigators to ensure threat information reaches agencies responsible for protecting lawmakers.<\/p>\n

\u201cPlease know that your safety is of the utmost concern of the PSP,\u201d Bivens wrote to the lawmakers. \u201cI am confident that these changes will address shortcomings we have identified in this recent occurrence.\u201d<\/p>\n

The incident was the latest amid increasing threats against lawmakers in Pennsylvania.\u00a0A New Mexico man<\/a>\u00a0was sentenced in March for threatening to bomb Shapiro\u2019s home, and police charged\u00a0a Carlisle man<\/a>\u00a0in February for allegedly threatening to stalk and injure the governor\u2019s family.<\/p>\n

Pa. governor mansion attack, security upgrades prompt new oversight push in Harrisburg <\/a><\/p>\n

Last year, a Harrisburg man broke into the state-owned Governor\u2019s residence\u00a0and set it ablaze<\/a>\u00a0while the governor and his family slept inside. The assailant, Cody Balmer, pleaded guilty to attempted murder and other charges in October.<\/p>\n

And it was in Butler that a gunman attempted to assassinate President Donald Trump during a campaign rally, wounding the president and two others and killing an audience member.<\/p>\n

Copyright 2026 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.<\/p>\n

For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to ABC27. <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"(WHTM) \u2014 The acting Pennsylvania State Police commissioner said the agency will change how it handles threats against…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":193916,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[86323,16452,85410,34046,2467,28,30,29,1224,7654],"class_list":["post-193915","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pennsylvania","tag-adam-g-berryhill","tag-capitol-police","tag-democratic-state-lawmakers","tag-george-bivens","tag-lebanon-county","tag-pennsylvania","tag-pennsylvania-headlines","tag-pennsylvania-news","tag-pennsylvania-state-police","tag-terroristic-threats"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193915","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=193915"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193915\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/193916"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=193915"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=193915"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=193915"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}