Terror At The Morgue

Did A Medical Examiner Strap A Bomb To His Own Neck?

(CBS) 
The assailant came armed with enough barbed wire to wrap Smith's ankles and wrists – and what looked like a crown of thorns around his head. "Once he had me wrapped up like that, then he told me to stand up and pushed me to the security grate on the window, and shackled me in a crucifixion position," says Smith.

After that, Smith says the assailant glued a homemade bomb to Smith's chest, and spoke for the first time: "He leans over and tells me, 'Push it, pull it, twist it, and you die. Welcome to death row.'”

Sometime after midnight, two hours later, a police officer on routine patrol discovered Smith in the stairwell. Veteran bomb squad members Willis and Blum were summoned to the scene.

"There wasn't any room for error," says Blum. "I was telling him that it’s very important that you remain calm, that we’re all in this together. We’re gonna get through it but we have to act as a team.”

"It's my job to grab a hold of the bomb," says Willis. "I grab a hold of this thing and I’m holding, trying not to move it.”

The officers managed to extricate Smith from his shackles. The bomb was removed and neutralized, and Smith was then rushed by ambulance to the hospital.

In the emergency room, the barbed wire twisted around Smith's face was cut away. Amazingly, he had escaped serious injury. He was treated for cuts and burns and then released.