ORONO – A bomb threat reported Wednesday at the University of Maine was one of approximately a dozen being dealt with at colleges and universities across the country just two days after Monday’s shooting massacre at Virginia Tech University.

“There is often a contagion effect of copycat behavior that occurs after a nationally publicized incident, such as that which occurred at Virginia Tech this week,” UM Public Safety Director Noel March said. “Unfortunately, someone chose to demonstrate this despicable behavior here at UMaine this morning.”

The threat was called in to UM Public Safety at 7:36 a.m. from an intercom phone outside of Oxford Hall, a dormitory. Police believe the caller was male, and Kennedy authorized a $5,000 reward for the arrest and conviction of the individual.

The threat resulted in a search of many campus buildings, including Memorial Union, by bomb sniffing dogs. No one was injured, and the search found nothing significant. The dogs were alerted at one point while searching lockers in the Class of 1944 Hall, but the State Police Bomb Squad found nothing.

“The result of these actions is the inconsiderate disruption to the lives of many students, faculty and staff, and an unnecessary cost to an already stressed university budget,” March said.

The public safety director said he intends to seek the most serious charges against the caller when he is caught.

Michael Roberts, deputy district attorney for Penobscot County, said the crime could be considered a class C felony for terrorizing which carries a fine of $5,000 and the culprit also can be ordered to pay restitution if the report is a false alarm.

“There’s a lot of staff and personnel costs involved,” March said.

March said he would request that restitution be paid to the university.

“I’m asking the university community to take a strong stand, and not stand for this disruption to our lives,” March said.

The university has set up a special telephone tip line. Anyone with information is asked to call 581-9255. Anonymous information also can be reported through the department’s Web site at www.umaine.edu/publicsafety and clicking on the campus eyes link.

As much as possible, it was “business as usual” on the campus, UM spokesman Joe Carr said.

“Police do not believe in any way this is credible, but they still had to take some actions,” he said.

Once the threat was assessed by police officials, the university embarked primarily on a communication effort to notify students, staff and faculty.

Professors were given the option to cancel classes, but most continued the day as scheduled.

“If they canceled classes and made such a big deal about it, people would probably keep doing it,” student Sara Sanderson, 21, said outside Fogler Library.

Sanderson was in class Wednesday morning when she heard of the threat. During a break, a classmate tried to go to Memorial Union and saw a pink sign – one of many posted by the university and assisting agencies throughout the campus – alerting people to the threat and directing them to UM’s Web site for more information.

In addition to the bright pink notices, e-mails were sent campus-wide and messages were posted on both the UM and Department of Public Safety’s Web sites.

Sanderson said she felt campus officials handled the communication aspect the best they could.

“Word travels by mouth probably faster than anything,” she said.

Sanderson’s teachers let class out early and cautioned students to go directly to their cars.

Sanderson said she went to Fogler because she had work to do.

“I feel extremely safe here,” she said. “It’s so stupid. Especially after such a tragedy.”

“It’s kind of cold-hearted,” her friend, Briana Chute, 21, said.

Robert Dana, UM dean of students, described the caller as a “pathetic individual.”

He condemned the caller for attempting to shift focus from Monday’s shooting tragedy at Virginia Tech University to the UM campus, but UM wasn’t the only place affected by copycat-like crimes.

The Associated Press reported that campus threats on Tuesday forced lock-downs and evacuations at universities, high schools and middle schools in at least 10 states.

“Threats in Louisiana, Montana and Washington state directly mentioned the massacre in Virginia, while others were reports of suspicious activity in Texas, Arizona, Oklahoma, Tennessee, North Dakota, South Dakota and Michigan,” the AP reported.

“I think that’s the worst of human nature,” Dana said, adding that he understands some people are sick. “This is down in the dirt nastiness.”

In addition to UM Public Safety, State Police and Penobscot County Sheriff’s Office officials, along with local police and fire crews responded to the incident.

Both state and county law enforcement provided bomb sniffing dogs that worked as a team to sweep Memorial Union and connecting buildings so it could be cleared as a “safe haven” for the UM community.

Memorial Union was reopened at 11:42 a.m., about an hour after the dogs began their search.

“That’s a real common area for students to gather,” State Police Lt. Wesley Hussey said.

Once the search was completed, Hussey said law enforcement and university officials would reassess the situation and decide how to proceed.

“The university is being really proactive about it,” he said.

A bomb squad unit was not immediately called to the scene, but was available when needed later in the afternoon.

Bomb sniffing dogs found something of interest in the 1944 Hall, which is connected to Memorial Union, but police officials weren’t overly concerned.

“We don’t believe that it’s anything or that it’s connected to this,” Carr said. “The dogs are trained to be sensitive to certain smells.”

The State Police Bomb Squad investigated the area, which included lockers near the theater department, but found nothing, Carr said.

“There was clearly something in the lockers that the dogs sensed, but the lockers were checked out thoroughly and nothing was found,” Carr said.

State Police have been on campus a few times in the last year or so, mostly before large sporting events to assist in crowd control.

“This really isn’t unusual for us to work with the University of Maine,” Hussey said.

The university automatically will conduct a critique of their actions following the bomb threat “in an effort to identify improvements that might be made to the campus’s Emergency Contingency Response Plan,” March said.

When asked if UM was a safe campus, March answered, “Absolutely.”

“The University of Maine is as safe today as it was yesterday.”