A 42-year-old Cincinnati man is facing criminal charges after court records say he threatened to burn Mount Healthy High School to the ground while students were inside attending class. Eric Holly was arrested Friday afternoon and booked on charges of disorderly conduct and making terroristic threats, according to court records.
The allegations are laid out in an affidavit filed in Hamilton County Municipal Court, as reported by FOX19. Court records say Holly was on school grounds while students were in class and that he threatened school staff members in addition to threatening to burn the building down.
According to the affidavit, the threats followed a disagreement involving another family and school personnel. The station's report notes that details leading up to that argument had not been disclosed as of Friday.
Court Date Set for Saturday
Holly is scheduled to appear in court Saturday, per the same account. No further details about the proceeding were available.
Ohio law treats threats against schools seriously under statute. Ohio Revised Code section 2909.23 states that a person who violates its terroristic threat provisions is guilty of a felony of the third degree, while section 2917.11 establishes disorderly conduct as a separate offense.
Part of a Wider Pattern of School Threats
The Mount Healthy incident arrives amid a string of school-threat cases across the Cincinnati region this year. Earlier in November, Florence police said an 18-year-old Erlanger man, Jonah Roark, allegedly threatened Dixie Heights High School and referenced the Columbine shooting, according to The Cincinnati Enquirer. Police said a detective filed a criminal complaint charging Roark with second-degree terroristic threatening, and he was being held at the Kenton County Jail.
Mount Healthy schools have dealt with threats before. In September 2024, the district canceled classes after threats circulated on social media, though officials later determined the threat was not credible and resumed classes the next day, WLWT reported at the time. That same report noted numerous Greater Cincinnati districts received threats against their schools in that period.
Other area schools responded differently to that 2024 wave. Local 12 reported that Taft High School, Lakota schools, the Northwest Local School District, and Princeton City Schools all received vague shooting threats on social media the same week, but unlike Mount Healthy, those districts remained open with heightened security rather than canceling classes, according to Local 12.
How Ohio Schools Are Required to Respond
A school safety expert told Local 12 that threat assessment procedures, protocols for heightening security during investigations, and crisis communication plans all factor into how school leaders decide whether to keep buildings open. Ohio law already requires every district to maintain a threat assessment team at each school serving grades six through 12, the same report noted.
Hoodline will continue following developments in Holly's case, including Saturday's scheduled court appearance.
