28 November 2008
Hamilton Police are praising the efforts of Warehouse staff and security guards after the discovery of a suspicious package required the clearing of a busy city shopping mall overnight.
Senior Sergeant Lance Tebbutt said Police and fire fighters were called to the 'Base Te Rapa' shopping complex shortly after 7pm.
"A suspicious package was discovered in the toilets of the Warehouse store and the manager quickly notified one of our officers working close by.
"It was decided the area would have to evacuated and at this point it was a case of the thin blue line being backed up by a sea of red, the Warehouse staff formed a line and quickly ushered shoppers to safety."
Because the discovery of the package coincided with the turning on of the Christmas Tree lights ceremony there was a lot more people at the shopping centre than would normally be expected.
"Coordinating with the Fire Service a safety cordon was established and shoppers evacuated from the surrounding area and here we were greatly assisted by security staff who helped us clear the scene," said Mr Tebbutt.
"The Auckland based Defence Force Bomb Disposal team was called in and cleared the scene using a robot, the package turned out to be a typewriter in it's case that had been left standing on it's side in the store's toilet block."
Mr Tebbutt said the focus of Police enquiries would now be to establish how the case came to be left in the toilet and if those responsible had any malicious intent?
"The scene was cleared about 10.40pm.
"Though no harm was done there were considerable resources brought in to deal with the situation not to mention the inconvenience caused to both shoppers and the stores so we'll be working to ensure there is no repeat of last night's events," said Mr Tebbutt.
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