Officers respond to bomb fears in town over ‘suspicious car’

Jun 30 2007 by Caroline Innes, Liverpool Daily Post

SCORES of people were evacuated and a 200-metre police cordon was set up after a bomb scare in Warrington.

Officers from Cheshire Police yesterday responded to calls from concerned members of the public about a “suspicious car” which had appeared to be dumped in Museum Street, in the town centre.

Locals had become worried about the Isuzu car after it had been left for some time and had a number of fixed penalty notices on it.

A spokesman for Cheshire Police said public fears were understandable following the incident in London yesterday morning where a car bomb had been planted in central London.

The spokesman said: “Bearing in mind what had happened in London just hours earlier, we took these concerns extremely seriously.

“We set up a cordon, evacuated the centre of Warrington and closed a number of roads while our officers carried out a thorough check of the vehicle.

“Checks were also carried out and we soon discovered that the owner of the vehicle was simply on holiday. The vehicle had been parked there for some time and a number of parking tickets had been issued.

“At 1pm we lifted the cordon and can confirm that this vehicle is safe.”