U.S. city Los Angeles shut more than 1,000 public schools Tuesday over a threatened attack with bombs and assault rifles, sending hundreds of thousands of students home as city leaders were criticized for overreacting to what authorities later said was likely a hoax.

    The emailed threat, which authorities said was “routed through Germany” but likely originated locally, was made nearly two weeks after a married couple inspired by Islamic State killed 14 people and wounded 22 others at a county office building 100 km away in San Bernardino.

    A Los Angeles Police Department spokesman said late in the day that the threat appeared to have been a hoax.

    Federal officials, who asked not to be identified, echoed an assessment by New York City Police Commissioner William Bratton that the decision in Los Angeles was an “overreaction” and that New York had received an almost identical threat that was quickly deemed not credible.

    Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti backed the decision and Police Chief Charlie Beck said it should not be second-guessed because the threat was “very specific to Los Angeles Unified School District campuses.”

    But the unprecedented move at the second-largest public school system in the United States left some 643,000 students and their parents confused and frustrated.

    Congressman Brad Sherman, a Democrat from California, told the New York Times that the writer of the email threat claimed to be a devout Muslim prepared to launch an attack using bombs, nerve gas and rifles with “32 jihadist friends” because he had been bullied at a Los Angeles high school. (SD-Agencies)