Scarlett Johansson’s Alleged Stalker Arrested for SNL Bomb Threat
A man Scarlett Johansson once accused of stalking her has been arrested for allegedly threatening to bomb Saturday Night Live's studios, where her husband Colin Jost works.
The New York Police Department took Michael Branham into custody April 2, one day after the alleged incident, according to court records obtained by E! News. At his arraignment, the 48-year-old pleaded not guilty to charges of falsely reporting an incident and making a threat of mass harm, NBC News reported, citing court documents. His bail was set at $100,000.
Branham was arrested after he messaged the bomb threat to a Connecticut college and an administrator at that college told police, two people briefed on the matter told NBC News. The threat was not deemed credible, two law enforcement officials said, per the outlet.
However, Branham's public defender, Jamie Niskanen-Singer, argued at the April 3 arraignment that a scammer could be behind the bomb threat, alleging that his client had been scammed in the past by people posing as Johansson online.
"He may have been hacked, your honor," the attorney said, per the New York Post, pointing out that the only evidence was a text message. "It’s very possible here that there is someone that is setting him up."
The judge denied the request and also issued both Johansson and Jost orders of protection against Branham at the arraignment, the New York Post reported. A hearing on the bomb threat case has been scheduled for April 8, court records show.
E! News has reached out to Branham's lawyer and Johansson's rep for comment and has not heard back.
In November 2023, Johansson—who shares son Cosmo, 3, with Jost and daughter Rose, 10, with ex-husband Romain Dauriac—filed a restraining order petition in a California court against a man with the same full name and of the same age as Branham, alleging that he had been harassing her since August 2022, and that his alleged behavior had escalated lately, The Blast reported.
In 2024, the court dismissed the Black Widow star's plea for protection on a technicality—the alleged stalker never received the papers. Per The Blast, Johansson's attorney confirmed he had been unable to serve him.
A person with Branham's name—whose location also matches that of a person with an identical name and age in public records—has shared several posts about Johansson on social media over the past month, including a selfie showing him bearing a chest tattoo of a human heart with her name written on it, according to a review by E! News.
E! and NBC News' parent company NBCUniversal declined to comment about the arrest, NBC News reported.
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