A cheesy bomb threat
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Tuesday, July 22, 2008 | 
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No comments [ Add Comment ]By Mitch Shaw
Standard-Examiner Staff
CENTERVILLE — A weekend bomb threat at Dick’s Market yielded nothing but a piece of string cheese.
Around 3 p.m. Saturday, Centerville police and units from South Davis Metro Fire responded to a phone call advising the Davis County Sheriff’s Office that a bomb had been placed inside the grocery store at 350 E. Pages Lane.
The store was evacuated shortly after the call came in. During the evacuation, a Dick’s employee reported seeing a cylindrical device wrapped in duct tape near a cooler of dry ice.
Additional units from area police departments were called in to assist with traffic control and the evacuation of Dick’s and nearby businesses.
Centerville police Lt. Paul Child said the businesses remained closed for about two hours while bomb-sniffing dogs and a bomb technician checked the building and determined it was safe.
The cylindrical device the employee saw turned out to be a piece of string cheese wrapped in duct tape, made to resemble a bomb.
A potential suspect was caught on a store surveillance camera planting the phony bomb near the ice box.
Child said detectives have interviewed “several persons of interest” and that the fake device has been sent to the crime lab for analysis and fingerprints.
“We are fairly confident we know who it is,” he said. “We aren’t searching for any other suspects.”
Child said the suspects in the case are juveniles.
While the store remained closed, customer carts full of groceries sat in the store unattended. Ice cream, milk and other items that required refrigeration were spoiled and had to be thrown out.
A play at the nearby Rodger’s Memorial Theatre had to be halted so the building could be evacuated.
“We don’t know what the motivation was or what they were thinking, but it was a major disruption and a scare for a lot of people,” Child said.
“The loss to area businesses will be in the thousands of dollars.”
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