The police are involved and it’s being dealt with
The Loose Women star contacted police on Tuesday when a twitter user, going by the handle @welcome_brian, sent her messages saying he had placed a bomb outside her house.
Referring to Coleen by her husband Ray’s surname, the troll tweeted: ‘Coleen Fensome – a bomb has been placed outside ur home and it will go off @22.47 HRS on a timer and trigger.’
In another disturbing tweet, the user wrote: ‘Coleen Patricia Fensome – U better watch urself cos I’m going 2 stalk U and find U then rape U.’
Twitter can be a scary place
The TV star - mum to Shane Jr, 24, Jake, 20, and Ciara, 12, – said she called police out of fear for her family’s safety.
She told a UK newspaper: ‘Any mother will tell you they will never stand to see their family even come to the slightest touch of harm so the police are involved and it’s being dealt with.’
Police are already investigating a troll – operating under a different name – who sent bomb threats, with the same time of 22.47 in them, to Blue’s Anthony Costa and Duncan James last week.
Coleen tweeted the boyband stars saying she had received similar threats to them.
Calling on Twitter to take action on trolls, Duncan James said on Newsnight on Wednesday: ‘Until people are named, shamed and prosecuted there is no deterrent.’
Both accounts have been suspended from the site.
The threats are also almost identical to ones sent to academic Mary Beard and female journalists last month.
However Coleen said she will not stop using the social networking site saying: ‘I’ll never be driven off Twitter by a small minority of twisted souls’
She said: ‘Twitter can be a scary place because sometimes you come across some very strange people who think that by hiding behind online profiles they have free range to bully, harass or abuse you.’
But the star, who is grieving the recent loss of her sister Bernie, said that Twitter also has it’s positives.
‘I’ve always taken the rough with the smooth on Twitter because it’s an amazing place of support and love,’ she said.
‘I know that the public were amazing supporting my sister Bernie on there and sending me messages of love for her when she was ill.
‘It was also a place I took comfort from during those dark hours hearing other people’s kind words during what can only be one of the most vulnerable times of your life – losing a loved one.’
UK Twitter boss Tony Wang said it took the issue of trolling seriously.