The suspect identified by authorities as 49-year-old Floyd Ray Roseberry from Grover, N.C. is now in custody.
It’s not clear if there was an actual bomb.
“He gave up, did not resist, and our folks were able to take him into custody,” U.S. Capitol Police Chief J. Thomas Manger said on Thursday. “We don’t know what his motives are at this time.”
Manger said police negotiated with Roseberry by writing on a white board. Eventually police used a robot in an attempt to give him a phone to communicate with, but Manger said Roseberry declined to use it. Manger said shortly afterwards Roseberry got out of the vehicle and he was taken into custody without incident.
U.S. Capitol Police Chief J. Thomas Manger speaks to reporters about police investigation on a report of a possible explosive device in a pickup truck outside the Library of Congress on Aug. 19, 2021.
Jose Luis Magana/AP
The truck has been removed from the scene. Manger said “we don’t know as of yet” whether there was an actual bomb.
Manger said Roseberry’s mother had recently died and that according to his family, “there were other issues that he was dealing with.
Earlier in the day, law enforcement officers from the Cleveland County, N.C., as well as federal law enforcement officials, went to Roseberry’s residence, said Philip Todd, chief deputy of the Cleveland County, N.C., sheriff’s office.
Several hours after the report of the incident, Facebook said it had deactivated a livestream, purportedly of the suspect in his truck.
9Naija 