Floyd Ray Roseberry: Capitol bomb threat suspect identified, told his wife he was going fishing
A man suspected of initiating a bomb threat in Washington DC has surrendered to law enforcement following a nearly five-hour standoff.
Floyd Ray Roseberry, 49, from Grover in southern North Carolina, brought the nation’s capital to a standstill after streaming his rambling threats to Facebook while parked on the pavement outside the Library of Congress.
US Capitol Police reported that a bomb was not recovered from the truck but “but possible bomb making materials were collected” after Mr Roseberry’s arrest.
He reportedly told a Capitol Police officer at the scene that he had a bomb, and “the officer noticed what appeared to be a detonator in the man’s hand,” according to Capitol Police.
Roseberry “was communicating by holding up hand-written signs through the front, driver-side window,” police said.
Officers then gave him a phone “in hopes of trying to continue the dialogue.”
Following an hours-long standoff, he followed officers’ instructions and crawled away from the truck.
Nearby Capitol office buildings were evacuated. Both the House and the Senate are on recess, meaning most lawmakers are in their home states, but staffers and Library of Congress employees were working near the scene, prompting the evacuations. Police also went door to door to alert residents in the area.
An eyewitness says she saw a man in a black pickup truck in front of the Library of Congress shouting that he had “a bomb” while tossing dollar bills out of the window.
Sydney Bobb, 22, a student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said she was on her way to a race in politics class near the Library of Congress at about 9.25am when she noticed the man in the vehicle.
“I was walking on that block because that’s where I go to class. He was shouting that he had a bomb. And then he threw money out the side of the truck,” Ms Bobb told The Independent by phone as she was being evacuated from her class.
The FBI and Department of Justice are assisting with the case.
