D.C. Police Set Off "Suspicious" Pressure Cooker Found Near Capitol

A bomb squad safely detonated a pressure cooker found in a vehicle near the Capitol on the Sunday of Memorial Day Weekend.

Not Available Lead
Complex Original

Image via Complex Original

Not Available Lead

The Associated Press reports that a bomb squad safely detonated a pressure cooker found in a "suspicious" vehicle near the Capitol yesterday, according to a Capitol Police spokeswoman. The vehicle was found on the National Mall, and the owner of the vehicle was later detained and arrested. 

Police Lieutenant Kimberly Schneider told the AP that officers spotted the vehicle during a "routine patrol" of the area—once the pressure cooker and "an odor of gasoline" was detected, a bomb squad arrived. The squad, known as the Hazardous Devices Section, was able to safely detonate the pressure cooker while the street was closed off, although there was a Memorial Day concert in Washington and it was unclear how big a crowd there was.

Lit. Schneider said that after the "items of concern" were destroyed (Schneider did not elaborate on what those items were besides the pressure cooker), the police performed a thorough search of the vehicle and found "nothing hazardous."

"If we can't determine whether or not an item is safe/dangerous, we'd have to treat it as dangerous until we determine otherwise," she told the AP in an email. She explain that is "why the items were safely disrupted, out of an abundance of caution."

The owner of the vehicle was later found and arrested. The charge was "Operating After Revocation."

Latest in Pop Culture