JK Rowling in the crosshairs: Police Scotland launched an investigation after a Twitter user threatened that the author of the Harry Potter books would be “next in line" after the attempted murder of Salman Rushdie.
Rowling posted two messages on her Twitter account condemning the stabbing of Salman Rushdie last Friday. One said, simply, "Horrifying news,” and the other, “Feeling very sick right now. Hope he's okay."
In response, a Twitter user named Meer Asif Aziz wrote her an explicit threat that read "Don't worry, you're next in line."
Rowling shared with her hundreds of thousands of followers the screenshot of the threat to her life and said that she contacted the Scottish police, who opened an investigation in an attempt to track down the person who threatened her life. "To everyone sending messages of support: Thank you. The police are involved (were already involved on other threats)," Rowling tweeted.
A spokesperson for Police Scotland confirmed that an investigation had been opened following the threat to Rowling's life, saying that, "We have received a report of an online threat, and the police are investigating the matter." A brief investigation revealed that the person behind the Twitter account that sent the threat against Rowling had published several tweets since Friday in which he praised Eddie Mater, who tried to assassinate Rushdie on stage in New York.
This is not the first time threats have been made against JK Rowling. In the past, threats were directed at her by LGBT community activists who accused her of "transphobia" after a series of tweets she published regarding transgender people.