NEW HAVEN, CT (CelebrityAccess) — Actor and stand-up comic T.J. Miller was arrested on Monday night at LaGuardia Airport in Queens after he was alleged to have called in a fake bomb scare while aboard an Amtrak train.
According to a press release from the United States Attorney for the District of Connecticut, Miller has been charged with intentionally conveying to law enforcement false information about an explosive device on a train traveling to Connecticut.
The charges stem from a March 18th incident where Miller was alleged to have called a 911 dispatcher to report that a woman on the train he was traveling on had an explosive device in her bag.
Amtrak officials stopped the train at Green’s Farms Station in Westport, where passengers were directed to detrain, and bomb squad members boarded and searched the train. No evidence of any explosive device or materials was detected.
However, it turns out Miller wasn’t even on the train, leading to a second train being subjected to a stop and search at the same station, again, without any explosives being located.
Investigators said that Miller would have been largely unable to see the woman he accused of carrying the bomb and alleged that his call-in was motivated by “a grudge against the subject female, and that he “continued to convey false information to investigators while the public safety response was ongoing.”
During the stop, Amtrak officers interviewed an attendant from the first class car where Miller had been seated during the trip and said he reported that Miller appeared to be intoxicated when he boarded the train and consumed several alcoholic drinks during the trip, the prosecutor’s statement said.
The attendant also told investigators that Miller had engaged in “several hostile exchanges” with the woman in question before he was removed from the train in New York for appearing to be intoxicated.
The incident is currently being investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Joint Terrorism Task Force, Connecticut State Police, Metropolitan Transportation Authority Police Department, Amtrak Police Department, and Westport Police Department.
Miller appeared before U.S. District Judge Jeffrey A. Meyer on Tuesday in New Haven and was released on a $100,000 bond. If convicted, he faces up to five years in prison.
Miller, who is a popular touring standup comic, most recently appeared for four seasons on the HBO comedy “Silicon Valley” but exited the show last year against what was reported to be creative differences with the show’s producers.
