At Raleigh City Hall, 3rd evacuation in a month finds no threat

Municipal workers at Raleigh City Hall spent about an hour in Nash Square Wednesday morning, waiting while police cleared the building after the latest bomb threat, the third threat in a month.

Posted 2:20 p.m. May 30, 2018 — Updated 3:14 p.m. Jul 13, 2018

RALEIGH, N.C. — Editor's Note: WRAL originally reported that Wednesday's threat was the second in a month against Raleigh's City Hall. In fact, it was the third. An evacuation on May 21 was so brief that WRAL didn't report on it when it happened.

Municipal workers at Raleigh City Hall spent about an hour in Nash Square Wednesday morning, waiting while police cleared the building after the latest bomb threat, the third threat in a month.

Police surrounded Nash Square in downtown Raleigh May 30, 2018, after a bomb threat at the nearby municipal building.

Police evacuated the building at 222 W. Hargett St. just after 10 a.m. and stood guard around the square until the all-clear was issued at about 11:30. No injuries were reported.

The building houses offices and chambers for the City Council, the city manager and the city's communications department, among others.

On the afternoon of May 14, police evacuated the building only to find nothing and allow people back inside after about half an hour. A similar incident happened on May 21.

On May 23, employees and visitors to Moore County Courthouse in Carthage were forced out after a similar threat. Again, nothing was found, and business resumed in a matter of a few hours.

Sheriff: Threats against schools on the rise

In April, Wake County Sheriff Donnie Harrison said his deputies had spent an increasing amount of time this spring chasing threats of bombs or guns at area schools. "I don't know how many we've had [this year]. We've had a ton," Harrison said.

Russ Smith, senior director of security for the Wake County Public School System, said there were only four bomb threats in the district in 2016-17. Smith did not have data for the 2017-18 school year, but he too said the numbers had jumped.

Over a period of two weeks in April, WRAL News reported on threats to three Wake County schools, all of which ended without a bomb being found, but that doesn't mean the threats are not costly.

Harrison said there is a cost to secure a building after a threat and to track down the source of the threat.

"We use a lot of manpower because, if we didn't look into every facet and something was to happen, I would feel responsible," he said. "I would be afraid to try to figure the cost."

"There has been a numerous increase in the number of bomb threats, the number of hoax bomb threats that are coming from overseas and other locations, I guess all geared to causing chaos," Smith said.

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