Suspicious wife who caused bomb scare – by hiding GPS tracker in her husband’s car
A SUSPICIOUS estranged wife hoping to secretly track her husband’s movements was left redfaced when she unwittingly sparked a huge bomb scare.
When the former soldier found a black box fitted with batteries hidden in his car, he feared the worst.
He dialled 999, telling the emergency operator: ‘It looks like there’s a viable device in my car.’
As the builder was ex-military, West Yorkshire Police saw him as a potential terror target and launched pre-planned emergency procedures. A cordon was set up around the vehicle while bomb disposal teams were called in.
Meanwhile Leeds City Council prepared to evacuate neighbours and place nearby schools on lock-down.
About an hour later, the man’s sheepish wife is understood to have admitted accidentally sparking the terror alert.
She revealed that the suspicious package was in fact a GPS tracker which she had secretly planted in his car.
Whether or not her suspicions were well-founded remained unclear last night as the couple, who have not been named, kept a very low profile. But the drama amused some in the quiet street where it unfolded – at least after the initial panic subsided.
The man is thought to have been working as a fire safety contractor in Woodhouse on Tuesday morning when he spotted the small black rubber-sealed package at 10am.
He dialled 999 and officers gave workers two minutes to leave the area after contacting bomb disposal experts. Meanwhile the council’s emergency planning team set about providing temporary accommodation for evacuated residents.
A spokesman for the authority said council officers also assessed which other venues, including schools and public buildings, may have needed evacuation if the device proved ‘to be an actual danger’.
At around 11am, a woman thought to be the man’s wife came clean and the alert was cancelled. There was no sign of the husband at home yester- day, but a fellow worker said he had told him how the device had rolled out from under the passenger seat.
‘It might sound funny but it certainly wasn’t,’ he said. ‘I was working away when, all of a sudden, the police told us we had to pack up what we could and get off the street. It was all very quick and quite unnerving. Eventually it turned out to be a tracker device, rather than a bomb, planted by the fella’s wife.’
He said that he believed the man had already separated from his wife – so had no idea why she had been spying on him.
A joiner added: ‘The first we knew about it was the police telling us to leave the street because of a bomb scare, and we didn’t hang around.
‘I’ve not seen the fella here today, I’m guessing he and his wife have had words since she planted the tracker.’
Resident Bruna Pereira, 26, a nurse, said: ‘I was in my flat and the police told me to leave because a car further down the road was suspicious.
‘It was scary but I am pleased it was not a real bomb.’
A police spokesman said: ‘Officers were called to a suspicious package in a car and an operation was put in place.’
No legal action is being taken against anyone involved, police sources said.
‘Suspicious wives are perfectly entitled to bug their husbands if they so wish,’ one said. ‘It accidentally caused an alert, but no offence was committed.’
‘I’m guessing he and his wife had words’