February 11, 2009 4:18 PM
- Text
FBI IDs Suspect In Store Bomb Threats
(CBS/AP)
The FBI has reportedly identified the suspect who has been calling in bomb threats to stores nationwide in the past week. Sources tell CBS News the bureau believes the suspect is located in Portugal.
CBS News partner station SIC Portugal has confirmation from the country's Judiciary Police that the FBI has asked for their cooperation in the investigation.
Police sources told SIC that the request was lodged via Interpol and that "action is being taken". The police "believe the calls have been made from Portugal."
SIC reports that the Portuguese police would not make any statement on the record regarding their cooperation in the U.S. investigation.
More than a dozen large grocery and discount stores in several U.S. cities have been targeted by a caller who threatens to blow up shoppers and workers with a bomb if employees fail to wire money to an account overseas, authorities said.
Frightened workers have wired thousands of dollars - and in one case took off their clothes - to placate a caller who said he was watching them but may have been thousands of miles away.
"At this point, there's enough similarities that we think it's potentially one person or one group," FBI spokesman Rich Kolko said from Washington.
No one has been arrested, no bombs have been found, and no one has been hurt, though the calls have triggered store evacuations and prompted lengthy sweeps by police and bomb squads. The FBI list includes:
In Newport, employees at a Wal-Mart got three calls Tuesday morning and wired three payments totaling $10,000 to an account out of the country, Sgt. James Quinn said. A spokeswoman for Wal-Mart Stores Inc. said the company was assisting in the investigation, but offered no further comment.
The first of the threats that federal investigators are aware of came a week ago Thursday at a Safeway in Sandy, Ore. The caller initially said he had a gun and was watching the store, but after meeting resistance to his demands he claimed to have a bomb, Sandy police Chief Harold Skelton said.
In Buchanan, Mich., on Monday, the caller directed employees of a Harding's market to lock the front doors, move to the front and told them not to call police, said Berrien County Sheriff Paul Bailey. The man claimed he could see some workers standing up, and ordered them to sit down.
"He's just ad-libbing," Bailey said. "He can't see anything."
Nonetheless, Bailey said, the employees were so afraid they wired the caller $3,000. The manager even hung up the phone when authorities called, saying a bomb would go off if he talked to them.
Bailey said that in a phone call with police, the man even offered to trade a "hostage" for a police officer to make his threat more believable.
The caller has not gotten every store he's called to give up money, but the FBI on Wednesday did not provide the total amount taken.
Also targeted were Dillons grocery stores in Hutchinson, Kan. At one store Tuesday, the caller ordered customers and employees to disrobe. Employee Marilyn Case told The Hutchinson News that store manager Mike Piros argued with the caller, but they relented when he continued to make threats and instructed them to "do it now."
He then demanded that one of Piros' fingers be cut off for every hour his demands were not met, and another employee got a butcher knife on his orders, Case said. Jim Peterson, a customer, told the newspaper that people became distraught.
"People came undone and started saying, 'No, no,'" he said.
Piros was not harmed. Police there initially said they were investigating whether the caller had hacked into the surveillance system, but later backed away from that possibility.
In the Kansas incident, no money was actually wired to the caller, reports the Hutchinson News: An FBI agent tells the newspaper Western Union "played a role" in stopping the transfers.
Other similar incidents in Hutchinson this week appear to be "copycat" crimes and not part of what FBI agent Jeff Lanza calls a "nationwide problem."
CBS News partner station SIC Portugal has confirmation from the country's Judiciary Police that the FBI has asked for their cooperation in the investigation.
Police sources told SIC that the request was lodged via Interpol and that "action is being taken". The police "believe the calls have been made from Portugal."
SIC reports that the Portuguese police would not make any statement on the record regarding their cooperation in the U.S. investigation.
More than a dozen large grocery and discount stores in several U.S. cities have been targeted by a caller who threatens to blow up shoppers and workers with a bomb if employees fail to wire money to an account overseas, authorities said.
Frightened workers have wired thousands of dollars - and in one case took off their clothes - to placate a caller who said he was watching them but may have been thousands of miles away.
"At this point, there's enough similarities that we think it's potentially one person or one group," FBI spokesman Rich Kolko said from Washington.
No one has been arrested, no bombs have been found, and no one has been hurt, though the calls have triggered store evacuations and prompted lengthy sweeps by police and bomb squads. The FBI list includes:
- a credit union in Albuquerque, N.M.;
- a Safeway store in Sandy, Ore.,;
- a grocery store in Buchanan, Mich.;
- Wal-Marts in Newport, R.I., and Rio Grande City, Texas;
- bank branches at Wal-Marts in Salem, Va., and Fairlawn, Va.;
- a Macey's grocery store in Orem, Utah;
- a Dillons grocery store in Hutchinson, Kan.;
- a bank branch in Milford, Conn.;
- a Vons in Vista, Calif., near San Diego;
- a bank in Savannah, Mo.;
- a bank in Ithaca, N.Y.;
- and banks in Tampa and Wesley Chapel, Fla.
In Newport, employees at a Wal-Mart got three calls Tuesday morning and wired three payments totaling $10,000 to an account out of the country, Sgt. James Quinn said. A spokeswoman for Wal-Mart Stores Inc. said the company was assisting in the investigation, but offered no further comment.
The first of the threats that federal investigators are aware of came a week ago Thursday at a Safeway in Sandy, Ore. The caller initially said he had a gun and was watching the store, but after meeting resistance to his demands he claimed to have a bomb, Sandy police Chief Harold Skelton said.
In Buchanan, Mich., on Monday, the caller directed employees of a Harding's market to lock the front doors, move to the front and told them not to call police, said Berrien County Sheriff Paul Bailey. The man claimed he could see some workers standing up, and ordered them to sit down.
"He's just ad-libbing," Bailey said. "He can't see anything."
Nonetheless, Bailey said, the employees were so afraid they wired the caller $3,000. The manager even hung up the phone when authorities called, saying a bomb would go off if he talked to them.
Bailey said that in a phone call with police, the man even offered to trade a "hostage" for a police officer to make his threat more believable.
The caller has not gotten every store he's called to give up money, but the FBI on Wednesday did not provide the total amount taken.
Also targeted were Dillons grocery stores in Hutchinson, Kan. At one store Tuesday, the caller ordered customers and employees to disrobe. Employee Marilyn Case told The Hutchinson News that store manager Mike Piros argued with the caller, but they relented when he continued to make threats and instructed them to "do it now."
He then demanded that one of Piros' fingers be cut off for every hour his demands were not met, and another employee got a butcher knife on his orders, Case said. Jim Peterson, a customer, told the newspaper that people became distraught.
"People came undone and started saying, 'No, no,'" he said.
Piros was not harmed. Police there initially said they were investigating whether the caller had hacked into the surveillance system, but later backed away from that possibility.
In the Kansas incident, no money was actually wired to the caller, reports the Hutchinson News: An FBI agent tells the newspaper Western Union "played a role" in stopping the transfers.
Other similar incidents in Hutchinson this week appear to be "copycat" crimes and not part of what FBI agent Jeff Lanza calls a "nationwide problem."
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