The Charlotte County Sheriff’s Office and Southwest Florida Regional Bomb Squad gave the all clear at 9:30 p.m. Tuesday evening after a nearly three hour shutdown of all stores and traffic in Village Market Place shopping center, 1825 Tamiami Trail.
The incident started when a 22-year-old Port Charlotte woman with her 1 and 4 year old children drove to the center to grocery shop at Save-a-Lot. She pulled into a parking space and a dark truck with two white “scruffy looking” males pulled up alongside her tan Jeep SUV and she couldn’t get out. They exchanged glances but the woman then drove forward to another space. She got out with her children and went shopping. When she came out, she put her kids in their seats and put the groceries in the SUV, she then noticed a note on her windshield. The note in essence said a bomb would go off if she started her vehicle.
The woman got the kids out immediately and called the CCSO at 6:23 p.m. Deputies, fire, EMS were called and evacuated the entire shopping center and all stores. The bomb squad arrived and at 8:25 p.m. deployed the robot along with two bomb squad men in safety gear. Bomb sniffing K9 teams also searched the center. After a thorough search of the vehicle and parking lot, the all clear was given and shoppers could get their vehicles and leave the area. CCSO detectives have taken the handwritten note into evidence and CCSO Forensics will look for fingerprints and analyze the hand righting on the note.
Detectives are working on a motive for the bomb threat. Detectives are asking the public if they have any information ,if they may have witnessed the two men in the dark truck at the tan Jeep SUV around 6 p.m. Tuesday evening, to call CCSO at 941-639-2101.

Source: Charlotte County Sheriff’s Office