The Fight Against Crime: Notes From The Front : Bomb Squads Often Blow Assignments

OK, so what do a blown movie script, blasted petunia seeds and dead kittens have in common? No, nothing to do with smell, although the script certainly might have stunk. And yes, while it is true that none of the above are readily available at finer department stores--or most anywhere else for that matter--that is not the proper answer either.

Give up?

Well, in the past few years, those things--and scores of other seemingly innocuous items--have been blown to smithereens by local bomb squads, which suspected that packages containing the flower seeds, the film treatment (and, alas, the kitty cats) were in fact, explosive devices left somewhere by terrorist bombers.

But before you pick up the phone to give the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department or Los Angeles Police Department a piece of your mind about the rude demise of the kittens, you should know that it was San Diego County authorities who dispatched them to feline heaven.

And, it occurred in 1986. And, one of the four kittens survived.

And besides, they’re sick of talking about it.

“You’re going to have a real hard time getting someone to say anything about that one,” said a San Diego County sheriff’s deputy who didn’t care to give his name.

Now, make no mistake, the work of police officers who nose around for bombs is dangerous, serious and very important. But all the same, every once in a while, when the fear is over and the drama ended, it turns out that something silly got blown up.

Most recently, the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department bomb squad rushed out to check on a package sent to Burbank’s Disney Studios for actor Tom Selleck.

Ka-Boom! There went a T-shirt and a package of petunia seeds from a fan in Illinois.

Bomb squad officers say false alarms greatly outnumber the discovery of actual bombs. In fact, the LAPD’s bomb squad gets called out 600 to 700 times each year, but finds only about 50 bombs per year, said Lt. Steven Allen, the squad’s head.

In 97% of the calls, Allen said, officers do not detonate anything. In fact, detonation is the last option, after bomb squads try robots equipped with TV cameras, remote controlled grappling hooks and even dogs trained to sniff out bomb ingredients.

Still, there are many instances in which police detonated something unusual, such as:

* At Cal State Dominguez Hills in the summer of 1993, the sheriff’s bomb squad blew up a graduate music student’s thesis, a 50-page score and accompanying cassette titled “Fue Cosa de Un Dia (It All Happened One Day).”

* Last May, LAPD officers at the Van Nuys station noticed a briefcase on top of a wall next to the watch commander’s parking space. After it was blown to bits, the cops realized it belonged to a traffic cop at the station who had gone home.

* In June, 1994, a man sent a package to the Century City offices of billionaire Martin Davis bearing the words: “This is a bomb threat.” Yes, the bomb squad blew up the package. What was inside? A movie manuscript about a human bomb from a screenwriter who desperately wanted to draw attention to his package. No word if it ever was read.

* The LAPD blew up a Nintendo video game at the airport in 1989, infuriating a man who was sending it as a Christmas gift to his nephews.

* In Beverly Hills in 1991, boom went a sealed package outside the Louis Vuitton shop on Rodeo Drive marked “gift” that turned out to be a pillow and blank diary.

* Earlier this month, a pre-emptive strike at a box found in a Glendale police station ridded the world of a box of cookies.

* And in December, 1993, the sheriff’s bomb squad blasted a package received at a bank in Santa Clarita: a wall-mounted air freshener.

The infamous kittens? They were left in a box outside a bank in Ramona. Later, sheriff’s deputies admitted they knew the box contained an animal, but did not know what kind. A few weeks earlier, a box containing a rattlesnake had been found in a woman’s driveway, and rather than fool with venomous fangs, they committed kitty-cide.

And have been hoping to live it down ever since.