LOS ANGELES : Police Detonate Device at Museum of Tolerance
Police detonated a military-style device outside the Simon Wiesenthal Center’s Museum of Tolerance on Tuesday, officials said, but it was not immediately clear if the object was a bomb.
The incident at the museum followed the bombing deaths of more than 100 people in a building housing Jewish organizations in Buenos Aires, 21 people aboard a commuter plane in Panama and two other bombings in London that left 18 people injured last month.
After staff members and visitors at the center at 9760 W. Pico Blvd. were evacuated, the device was detonated by the bomb squad experts at 6 p.m.
The center, named for the famed Nazi hunter, was established in 1977 and is dedicated to the study of the Holocaust and the preservation of its memory.
The call regarding a suspicious package came to police about 1:20 p.m. Traffic was diverted from the area as ordnance experts examined the package, said Los Angeles police spokeswoman Monique Shackelford.
Traffic on Pico Boulevard was blocked from Century Park East to Beverwil Drive.
It was the second bomb scare at the center since July 28, shortly after the blasts in Buenos Aires and London. The July call was canceled after experts went over two suspicious trailers parked near the center and found they had been rented to a center employee.
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