In early November, an employee of the Dollar Tree in Price made a phone call to dispatch, stating that a male had called the store and claimed that he had placed a bomb inside it about 20 minutes prior.
The Price City Police Department, Carbon County Emergency Response Management Director, Price Fire Department and Carbon County Ambulance were dispatched to stage in an adjacent parking lot, with assistance from multiple other law enforcement agencies such as Helper City Police and the Carbon County Sheriff’s Office.
Surrounding businesses such as Lin’s Fresh Market, Origins Fusion Grill and Taco Time were evacuated by law enforcement at that time and the buildings were searched for identifiable weapons, though none were discovered.
Following this, the Utah County Bomb Squad Canine Detection Unit was recruited and arrived approximately two hours after the initial call. The detection unit cleared the building as no devices or explosives were found. The employee that had made the initial call informed an officer that the individual who phoned in stated that he had placed the bomb due to not being hired by Dollar Tree.
It was reported that the employee then completed a written statement that allegedly had the same information, which affirmed it under oath. Investigation on the employee’s cell phone shows that there was an 11-minute delay to when she called Price Dispatch and inconsistent statements provided to different agencies as to when the call was received.
With the alleged inconsistencies, Price City Police Sergeant Kelly Maynes served a subpoena to Emery Telcom following the alleged threat, requesting all telephone calls made to or from the store during the timeframe the employee had stated. The result showed that only two calls were made to Dollar Tree in the recent call history, with the last being placed two hours prior to what was stated.
With the additional information in place, the employee was once again interviewed, then allegedly stated the belief that the Dollar Tree was going to be robbed by a fellow employee’s acquaintance, which was why the false bomb threat was made.
The employee now faces a number of charges, including making a false alarm and emergency reporting abuse weapon of mass destruction, both second-degree felonies. The employee also faces written false statement and false information to a law enforcement officer charges, which are both class B misdemeanors.