Durham police blow up suspicious suitcase

A Durham County bomb squad on Monday detonated a suitcase that was left in a park near Northgate Mall.

A resident saw a man leave the suitcase behind a park bench at the corner of Sovereign and Albany streets at about 2:30 p.m. Members of the Durham Police Department's Biological-Chemical Emergency Response Team and the Durham County Sheriff's Office bomb squad responded to the scene and asked nearby residents to leave their homes.

The bomb squad tried to X-ray the suitcase twice, but experts couldn't determine from the images whether any explosives or hazardous materials were inside. So they blew up the suitcase.