A 19-year-old Missouri man has been arrested for calling in a fake bomb threat at a Ford assembly plant saying he had an AK-47 and C4 strapped to his chest so he and his 2,200 co-workers could get off work early.

The incident took place at a Ford car factory in Kansas City, in the US state of Missouri, on 18th July and the suspect has been named as Zachariah Peterson, 19.

The authorities raided the assembly plant in what has been described in local media as a ‘swatting’ incident – the illegal practice of making a hoax emergency call to law enforcement typically resulting in SWAT raiding a location.

Peterson allegedly used voice modifying software on his phone to make the call to the factory’s security team at around 5:30pm, claiming that he was inside a bathroom with “an AK-47 rifle, with three magazines, a handgun and had one pound of C4 explosives strapped to his chest.”

The suspect did not identify himself during the call but said that he would start shooting if his 2,200 colleagues were not immediately evacuated, adding that “he was tired of being worked like a slave and his hours were getting cut.”

Newsflash obtained a statement from the Clay County Sheriff’s Office on 19th July saying: “Zachariah A. Peterson, 19, has been charged with one count of making a terroristic threat. He is being held on a USD 150,000 [GBP 116,640] bond in the Clay County Detention Center.”

They had previously said on 18th July: “We are investigating a possible threat at the Ford plant in Claycomo. The plant has been shut down and evacuated.

“Our Special Tactics and Response (STAR) Team was unable to locate anyone on their initial search of the area where the suspect said he was located. Additional tactical teams from around the area are joining to help us search & clear the rest of the factory.”

But then in the early hours of 19th July, at around 2:30am, they said: “We and our partner agencies have finished searching the Ford plant. We did not locate anyone inside and have determined the threat was not credible.

“Investigation into the source of the threats is ongoing.”

And then on 19th July, they said: “We, alongside the Claycomo Police Department and our federal partners, have made an arrest in last night’s hoax threat at the Ford plant. The suspect is in custody in our Detention Center. We cannot share any further information about the suspect at this time as investigators are working to prepare the case for prosecution.”

A few hours later they issued the latest statement naming the suspect.

The investigation is ongoing.