Ventura – The City of Ventura is home to one of Southern California’s more picturesque beachfront promenades, providing a well-maintained mile-long pedestrian and bicycle venue fronting a spectacular view of the Pacific just yards away. It’s the kind of place where surfers, tourists, joggers, senior citizen-strollers, and dog walkers mingle in an atmosphere of tranquility and appreciation for nature.
But when that tranquility is disturbed by something completely out of place, alert citizens are quick to notify Ventura City Lifeguards and California State Parks officers, just as they did in the early evening of March 9th when the Ventura Police Communications Center received a 911 Emergency call reporting a man on the promenade carrying what appeared to be an incendiary device. According to VPD’s Watch Commander’s report to the media, as police units were enroute to respond, ‘the reporting party hailed a California State Parks Officer” at a nearby lifeguard tower, urging him to address the situation.
The Parks Officer soon made contact with Steven Thomas Conklin, a 22-year old resident of Florida, and found him carrying “a large glass bottle with a towel sticking out of the top and resembling a Molotov Cocktail.” When taken into custody, Conklin mentioned that he “was going to blow something up,” probably not the sort of comment his defense attorney would have had him make.
When Ventura City Fire Department personnel arrived on the scene, they dismantled what appeared to be a viable destructive device filled with lighter fluid. Conklin was then transported to Ventura County Jail for booking on charges of possession of a destructive device.
Photo: Courtesy www.dogsniffer.com
Read more:
EdHat: Possession of destructive device
KCLU: Man arrested with explosive device
