Newsletter
Newsletter Support JNS

Fifth-grade NYC teacher arrested for alleged online threats

Joshua Penn was charged with second-degree aggravated harassment and pleaded not guilty, reportedly.

Police car lights
Police car lights. Credit: tevenet/Pixabay.

A fifth-grade teacher at a Manhattan private school was arrested after allegedly posting online threats aimed at participants in an interfaith event at the City College of New York, prosecutors and law-enforcement sources said, according to the New York Post.

Joshua Penn, 39, of Corlears School, is accused of sending the message after a Nov. 13 event, during which a speaker singled out a “Zionist” attendee and urged Muslim students to walk out.

Penn reportedly admitted to police that he sent the messages. He was charged with second-degree aggravated harassment and pleaded not guilty, per the Post. His next court date is set for Jan. 15. Corlears School told Post that Penn is on administrative leave.

“These people are demonic. Disrupting the truth, disrupting stories of tragedy and heroism. They should be ashamed of themselves,” Phelim McAleer, who wrote the play with his wife, Ann McElhinney, told JNS.
“This is my responsibility, that each one of the kids will get the same treatment, the same money,” Mody Kidon, of the Israeli Children’s Fund told JNS.
Three years after the Oct. 7 Hamas massacre, the families of Capt. Elay Adany and those he helped rescue remain bound by his final acts of courage.
Of the 6,000 Gazans who invaded the country on Oct. 7, 2023, 4,000 have been eliminated, said Israel Katz.