Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, April 20, 1995 TAG: 9504250012
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-7 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MATT CHITTUM STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
About 9:45 p.m., a muffled boom echoed down Salem Avenue. The bag contained some personal items, but no bomb.
The man believed responsible for the threat, David Curtis Noah, 46, had been arrested three hours earlier on a Florida fugitive warrant when he walked into the bus station in downtown Roanoke.
"The police came in and were showing me a picture of him and he just happened to walk up next to them," said R.W. Snapp, who works in the bus station.
The drama began about 3:15 Wednesday afternoon, in the wake of the explosion that ravaged the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City.
That's when a man who identified himself as David Curtis Noah called in a bomb threat to the Poff Building on Franklin Road in Roanoke, according to Roanoke Police Sgt. Guy Hurley. Federal marshals in the Poff building traced the call to a Salem Avenue eatery and alerted Roanoke police. The building was not evacuated.
Hurley said they learned from police in Monroe County, Fla., that Noah was wanted for a violation of probation for petty larceny.
After arresting the man, police confiscated his bags, Hurley said. Because of the earlier bomb threat, Hurley called in the state police to check on the possibility that one of them contained a bomb.
"We X-rayed the package, but that still didn't answer all the questions," said State Police Special Agent Gus Necessary. So, Necessary and another agent buried the suitcase and detonated it by remote control.
Hurley said Florida has agreed to extradite Noah. Noah likely will be questioned by the FBI in relation to the bomb threat before he goes anywhere, though. He had not been charged with making the threat.
by CNB