New York - A man who triggered a bomb scare and the evacuation of New York's Penn Station has been arraigned on charges of making a terrorist threat and falsely reporting an incident, prosecutors said Monday.
Raul Claudio, 43, was arrested on Sunday following a dispute with a train ticket agent, during which he placed a bag on a counter and said there was a bomb inside.
Security on New York's trains and buses has been tightened significantly in the wake of the attacks on London's transport system and Claudio's bomb claim prompted the immediate evacuation of Penn Station, a major suburban and long-distance railway hub.
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The station was closed for more than one hour as the bomb squad was called in to check the bag, the contents of which were found to be harmless.
Claudio had reportedly become enraged when the ticket agent could not retrieve his reservation. He faces a maximum jail sentence of seven years on each charge.
Following his arraignment, Claudio remained in police custody Monday, having failed to make bail set at 15 000 dollars, a Manhattan District Attorney spokeswoman said.
In a further example of the jitters spread by the incidents in London, another false alarm on Sunday resulted in police boarding a double-decker sightseeing bus in Manhattan after a report of five men with backpacks behaving suspiciously.
The 60 people on board were made to disembark with their hands above their heads, as the five men were handcuffed and searched. None were found to pose a threat.
The incidents came after New York police - again in response to the London bombings - implemented a random search policy Thursday on the city's massive subway system.
In a city that still bears the physical and psychological scars of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attack on the World Trade Centre, the presence of police, anti-terrorist units and National Guard troopers has become a common feature of subway travel.
But the stop-and-search policy marks a new departure that some feel comes precariously close to infringing on deep-rooted notions of civil liberties.
The New York Civil Liberties Union has said it is considering a lawsuit against the city on the grounds that the search policy was unconstitutional. - AFP
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