HOLMES BEACH – Police responded to two separate bomb threats and a mass shooting threat at the White Sands Beach Resort, 6504 Gulf Drive, on Nov. 21.
“We’re doing everything we can to identify the suspect who called in the bomb threats,” Holmes Beach Police Chief Bill Tokajer said. “We do not believe there’s any danger to the public at this time.”
Tokajer said no explosives were located, no shooting occurred and, as of mid-day Saturday, a suspect had not been identified or apprehended.
Tokajer said the first bomb threat was received Friday morning with the second received between 4-5 p.m. that afternoon.
“We had two bomb threats yesterday from the same guy. He also did another one yesterday in North Carolina,” Tokajer said. “I have a meeting set up with ATF (the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives) on Monday. They’re going to come down and we’re going to try to identify him through the phone calls and take legal action. We have the name he gave us but we don’t know if that’s an accurate name.
“In the morning, the guy said he placed some explosives near the fence at the pool. We think he knows so much about the resort because of the livestream they do from there. In the afternoon, he said he buried some explosives in the sand. We had the Manatee County bomb dog come out in the afternoon to make sure there were no buried explosive devices,” Tokajer said.
“We had to cordon off the area and there’s a lot that goes into responding to a bomb threat that seems like it could be credible. We stopped all traffic because he said he was coming in a silver truck and he would shoot a lot of people. We were prepared for someone coming in a silver truck to detonate a bomb and/or become an active shooter. We have to take those things seriously until we can determine it’s not a threat,” Tokajer said.
Both police responses resulted in temporary road closures and traffic delays in the vicinity of the resort.
