Cult Plot Against Disneyland Denied : Security: Federal officials say threat that sent scientists and Army chemical warfare team to theme park was a hoax.

Federal law enforcement officials Saturday denied that a Japanese cult had planned to release nerve gas at Disneyland during the crowded Easter weekend and said a threat received by park officials was a hoax.

Justice Department spokesman Carl Stern said in Washington that the FBI has launched a criminal investigation to determine who was responsible for the phony threat, which prompted worried officials to secretly dispatch scientists and an Army chemical warfare team to Disneyland.

Disneyland spokesman Tom Brocato said Saturday that the park’s security office received a threat April 13 in a letter and videotape that showed a man wearing rubber gloves and mixing chemicals. U.S. authorities were immediately notified, according to Disneyland officials, who refused to provide further details of the incident.

Stern said the anonymous threat implied that a gas attack similar to the one in Tokyo in March could be expected at the Orange County theme park. The Japanese doomsday cult Aum Supreme Truth is suspected of releasing the nerve gas sarin in Tokyo’s subways, killing 12 people and afflicting 5,500. The cult denies responsibility.

On Saturday, federal law enforcement officials in Southern California and Washington discounted a story published Saturday in the Baltimore Sun that two Japanese tourists had been apprehended at Los Angeles International Airport “a few days before Easter” with instructions on how to make sarin.

“A report of the apprehension of two Japanese individuals . . . in connection with the (Disneyland) matter is not correct,” Stern said.

Paul West, the Baltimore Sun’s Washington bureau chief, said Saturday that the facts in the paper’s story are accurate.

The FBI concluded that the threat was a hoax, but officials initially thought it was serious enough to mobilize a chemical warfare team from the Army’s Aberdeen Proving Grounds in Maryland and scientists from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta.

“We have an obligation when such threats are received to put federal resources in place whether we believe the threat is real or not,” Stern said.

President Clinton and other federal officials praised the Army and other U.S. agencies for their coordinated and speedy response to the perceived threat.

“In this instance, local and federal units, including the FBI, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, Department of Defense, Public Health Service and others, put people and equipment into place with extraordinary speed and coordination,” Stern said. “It was a highly successful deployment of resources.”

President Clinton said at a news conference Friday that the multi-agency reaction was an example of the government’s ability to respond to a terrorist threat. This counterterrorist capability is something “the public does not see, most of which I should not comment on,” the President said.

White House officials confirmed Saturday that he was talking about the Disneyland incident.

Investigators said Saturday that the hoax may have been perpetrated by a current or former Disneyland employee. A federal official said investigators are working on that premise because the threat was made against the theme park’s “guests,” a term used by the park for its customers, and the letter and videotape were sent to the Disneyland security office.

Heightened security at the “happiest place on Earth” was apparent over the Easter weekend. Spokesman Brocato acknowledged that the park had extra guards on duty and that more visitors’ bags were checked than normal, but he denied that the increased security had anything to do with the threat.

Marybeth Jones, a Beverly Hills resident who visited the park April 14, said that “pretty much everyone going through the gate was asked to open their bags.” Jones, a Florida native, said that she has visited Disney World numerous times but that guards there had never checked her bag.

“I was carrying a backpack, and the guard asked me to show him the inside of the bag,” Jones said. “I didn’t think anything of it. I figured it was a normal thing to check for guns or drugs. The guard was very nice and not at all intrusive.”

Media reports that Disneyland may have been a terrorist target did not hurt attendance Saturday, Brocato said. He said the park was “very busy” and attributed the large turnout to the comfortable spring weather.

Coming to light in the wake of the terrorist bombing in Oklahoma City, the hoax raised concern among some Disneyland visitors but not enough to make them cancel their trips to the park.

Kevin Wood, who was visiting Disneyland with his wife and two children from Adelaide, Australia, said he had heard about the scare but went ahead with the family’s plans to visit the park. “You are angry and disappointed. In this world, you come to expect anything. Nothing is a surprise anymore,” he said.

Brocato declined to reveal many details about the park’s security operation, but insisted that customer safety is a major priority.

In February, Disneyland officials said there were 382 security personnel responsible for the park’s 250 acres--a huge number compared to the 352 Anaheim police officers patrolling the 30,800 acres of the city outside.

Disneyland’s unarmed guards roam various areas of the park, dressed according to the themes of adjacent rides, Brocato said. Adventureland, with its new Indiana Jones ride, has guards in jungle garb; Tomorrowland, near Space Mountain, has security forces wrapped in futuristic robes.

The Anaheim Police Department, which has no official substation at the park, sends officers there every day, Brocato said.

Though Disney officials have long been loath to reveal crime statistics about the park, planning documents released in 1992 for the park’s expansion proposal said there were 5,292 security incidents at Disneyland in 1991, most of them involving theft, vandalism, assault, car theft, shoplifting or trespassing.

Times staff writers Jeff Brazil, J.R. Moehringer, Jodi Wilgoren and Jim Newton contributed to this report. Reza, Moehringer and Wilgoren reported from Orange County, Ostrow from Washington, and Brazil and Newton from Los Angeles.