Previously: BART Stations Reopened After Suspicious Device Deemed Harmless By Bomb Squad
A “bomb-type device” found in the trunk of a car in San Leandro this morning was determined not to be a genuine explosive device, a police spokesman said.
Police pulled over a vehicle near San Leandro and Marina boulevards — in front of the Boys and Girls Club — for displaying false license plates and discovered a suspicious device in the trunk of the car at 7:30 a.m., San Leandro police Lt. Jeff Tudor said.
Police searched the vehicle and also found heroin and drug paraphernalia, Tudor said.
The suspect was arrested and is now in police custody, San Leandro police Lt. Christopher Tankson said.
The Boys and Girls Club was not yet open and the mostly residential area was evacuated, according to San Leandro police.
The Alameda County bomb squad arrived at the scene and conducted tests, including an X-ray, Tudor said.
The device “did not contain an explosive,” Tudor said.
Tudor, who was not at the scene, reported that the package was a roughly 12-by-12-foot box covered in what appeared to be duct tape and had wires coming out of it.
He also said there was an older model cell phone attached to the package.
“It was a fake device, something this guy just made,” Tudor said.
The incident caused precautionary BART closures at the Oakland Coliseum, San Leandro and Bay Fair stations beginning at 8:30 a.m., BART spokesman Linton Johnson said.
The car containing the suspicious device was about 20 yards from BART tracks, Johnson said.
All three stations had reopened as of 10:11 a.m., according to BART officials.
AC Transit busses were rerouted during the incident, Tankson said.
The suspect, described as a man in his 40s, was arrested for possession of a fake explosive device, possession of drugs, possession of drug paraphernalia, and possession of stolen property, Tudor said.
Police did not specify what the stolen property was.
Law enforcement officials had secured the scene and the evacuated residents were back in their homes by 11:30 a.m.
“Everything is back to normal, for the time being,” Tankson said.
The incident remains under investigation.
