Federal Bureau of Investigation agents are examining a bomb threat at a Boulder grocery store to determine whether it is part of a broader scheme to extort money from businesses across the country.
The threat was phoned in to the King Soopers store at 30th Street and Arapahoe Avenue on Tuesday. The caller said that store employees should wire money to a certain account or the caller would remotely set off a bomb that had been placed in the store, said FBI spokeswoman Rene Vonder Haar.
Employees called police, who closed the store while they swept for explosives. Neither the initial search nor a second search with a bomb-sniffing dog turned up any explosives, said Boulder police spokeswoman Julie Brooks.
But Vonder Haar said FBI agents have taken an interest because the case is similar to threats called in to stores in at least 11 other states in the past week.
“It’s the same m.o. that we’ve seen nationwide,” she said.
Law enforcement officials say the caller claims to have a bomb and orders the store to send money to an account through an in-store money transfer service such as Western Union.
He often claims to be able to see inside the store, but officials believe he was making it up. In at least one case, investigators have traced the call to a cellphone somewhere in Portugal.
No one has been arrested, no bombs have been found, and no one has been hurt, although the calls have triggered store evacuations and prompted lengthy sweeps by police and bomb squads.
“What we’ve seen nationwide is that this is a hoax, that there are no bombs but that people are receiving the threats,” Vonder Haar said. “But, of course, every one has to be taken very seriously to make that determination.”
Brooks said she doesn’t believe employees at the Boulder store wired any money. But in the other cases, frightened workers have wired thousands of dollars — and in one case took off their clothes — to placate a caller who said he was watching them.
In Newport, R.I., employees at a Wal-Mart got three calls Tuesday morning and wired three payments totaling $10,000 to an account out of the country, Newport Sgt. James Quinn said.
In Buchanan, Mich., on Monday, the caller directed employees of a Harding’s Market to lock the front doors, move to the front and told them not to call police, said Berrien County Sheriff Paul Bailey. The man claimed he could see some workers standing up and ordered them to sit down.
“He’s just ad-libbing,” Bailey said. “He can’t see anything.”
The threats have created some scary moments for store employees and customers.
At one Hutchinson, Kan., grocery store Tuesday, the caller ordered customers and employees to disrobe.
Employee Marilyn Case told The Hutchinson News that store manager Mike Piros argued with the caller, but they relented when he continued to make threats and instructed them to “do it now.” He then demanded that one of Piros’ fingers be cut off for every hour his demands were not met, and another employee got a butcher knife on his orders, Case said.
Jim Peterson, a customer, told the newspaper that people became distraught.
“People came undone and started saying, ‘No, no,’ ” he said.
Piros was not harmed.
The FBI also is investigating threats at stores in Arizona, California, Maine, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Texas, Utah and Virginia.
Sherry Johnson, a spokeswoman for Englewood-based Western Union, said the company was working with the FBI and U.S. Secret Service to trace the money sent through the service.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Staff writer John Ingold can be reached at 720-929-0898 or jingold@denverpost.com.
