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Westboro Baptist Church target of bomb threat
Westboro Baptist Church, whose members are standing trial in Baltimore for protesting a military funeral, was the target of a bomb threat Monday afternoon but a two-hour search by Topeka police turned up no explosives.
The Topeka Police Department’s bomb squad responded to the threat at about 3:30 p.m. Monday by blocking off streets and knocking on doors in the vicinity of the church, 3701 S.W. 12th.
Police spokesman Capt. Jerry Stanley said an anonymous phone call from an unknown source “stated there was going to be an explosion at the church.”
Officers with bomb-sniffing dogs from the police department and Kansas Highway Patrol investigated the area late Monday afternoon.
During the search, several blocks near the church were blocked off, including S.W. 12th Street.
After concluding their search, police re-opened the streets at 5:30 p.m., Stanley said.
Church spokeswoman Shirley Phelps-Roper said the bomb threat likely was in response to a trial in Baltimore, where the church is being sued by the father of a Marine who was killed in Iraq.
Closing arguments are scheduled for today.
In spite of Monday’s threat, she said, church members won’t be swayed from continuing their anti-homosexual protests.
“It was darn decent of them to give us warning this time,” Phelps-Roper said in a telephone interview from Baltimore. “Last time, they just bombed us without warning.”
A pipe bomb exploded outside the home of Phelps-Roper in August 1995, damaging a van and a fence. No one was injured in the incident.
On Monday afternoon, church members who live in the area took their children to another location while the search was taking place, Sam Phelps-Roper said.
“If they’re making a phone call, it’s probably not a bomb,” he said. “We are not going to change the message, whether they put us on trial for our religion or attack us. We’re not going to be ashamed of our testimony.”
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