A man was arrested Monday after he allegedly called the West Palm Beach Police Department from the mental health services unit of a hospital to report a bomb that wasn’t actually there, according to an arrest report.
Police said the caller dialed 911 at around 8:42 a.m. and interrupted the dispatcher during the 9-second call to say, "There's a bomb in your parking lot. "
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The call prompted the closures of Banyan Boulevard to Clematis Street, Rosemary Avenue to Sapodilla Avenue, the Sapodilla parking garage and partially evacuated police headquarters.
Police and K9s spent six hours clearing the area.
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The alleged threat was traced to a phone in the common area of the adult mental health services unit at HCA Florida JFK North Hospital, police said.
Surveillance video showed a man “accessing the area which contains the unit’s patient phone” alone, right when the 911 call was placed. Then, “the individual suddenly gets up and walks away from the phone, walking down adjoining hallways and returning to a patient room.”
The man in the video was identified by a nurse as Luke Cahill, 32, who was reportedly “extremely agitated at the time of the incident” and “demanding to be released from the facility.”
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At the time, Cahill was being held under a Baker Act, after he allegedly accosted a Sheriff’s Office employee in the parking lot of their headquarters and threatened “to kill PBSO employees and their children,” the arrest report states.
After his arrest, Cahill allegedly identified his voice in the audio recording of the 911 call but said he did not remember making it. He said he was in physical pain, psychological distress and had not received his medication, police said.
The suspect was charged with one count of false report of a bomb against state property.