Sarasota Police Department officers report that individual talked of suicide when he was apprehended
A 67-year-old Sarasota man has been charged with making a false bomb threat at Selby Public Library in downtown Sarasota during the night of July 18, the Sarasota Police Department has reported.
“No one was injured in this incident,” an agency news release pointed out.
As of late morning on July 23, Todd Stephen Williams still was being held without bond in the Sarasota County Jail, Sarasota County Sheriff’s Office Corrections Division records show. His arraignment was scheduled for Aug. 30, records note.
Williams’ address is listed in his Probable Cause Affidavit as that of the Resurrection House on Kumquat Court in Sarasota, a facility that provides services for homeless individuals.
A Sarasota Police Department news release said that officers were called to the library “shortly before 8 [p.m.]” on July 18. Selby Library stands at 1331 First Street.
Initially, an updated Police Department release pointed out, the caller said that an individual at the library claimed “to have explosive materials in his backpack and [was] making threats to harm others.”
As a result, the updated continued, “The building was safely evacuated, and officers were able to take the suspect into custody.”
When the officers arrived, the affidavit pointed out, they “established a perimeter, and made sure that all exit points of the library were stationed with an officer, in case the defendant attempted to exit. After officers established the perimeter,” the affidavit continued, one officer called out “that the defendant was approaching the main entry door.”
Multiple officers and Police Department supervisors on the scene aimed their weapons at Williams as they “[issued] verbal commands [for him] to drop the backpack that he was carrying” and to lie prone on the floor. He complied with the commands, the affidavit said.
“The Sarasota Police Department’s Explosive Materials Unit (EMU) responded to investigate the backpack and any items inside it. The EMU determined the backpack was free of any explosive devices,” an agency news release noted.
The Probable Cause Affidavit said that when officers made contact with Williams at the library, “[H]e stated, ‘shoot me, please shoot me’ multiple times and continued to make suicidal statements, advising that he wanted to kill himself.”
After Williams was in custody, the affidavit added, Williams “made multiple spontaneous utterances … stating, ‘I have a gun,’ and that he thought about using it earlier.”
The affidavit noted that library employee Heather Tweed “had the most extensive interaction” with Williams. She told officers “that she had been attempting to close the library when she had observed the defendant walk inside with a backpack. Tweed stated that the defendant purposefully walked toward her and another employee, Michael Donovan, with the backpack in front of him.”
Tweed reported that Williams told her “he had a bomb in the bag,” the affidavit continued.
As Tweed and Donovan tried to back away from him, the affidavit said, Williams kept approaching them. She “called 911 immediately,” the affidavit pointed out, and then she used the intercom “to notify the others still inside the building of the emergency,” telling them “to evacuate immediately.”
The affidavit added, “Multiple other witnesses” who had been in the library confirmed Tweed’s statements.
One witness, Gary Hartman, reported to officers that Williams had approached him before Williams entered the library, the affidavit continued. Hartman said that Williams told him in Five Points Park, outside the library, that Williams was planning to “go postal” and that he had a .40-caliber firearm.
Hartman told Williams to leave, the affidavit said, but he watched Williams continue to approach the library.
Hartman added that Williams told “a group of kids and their parents outside” the same thing that he had said to Hartman, the affidavit added.
Hartman did not follow Williams into the library, the affidavit said.
A Sarasota News Leader review of the records maintained by the Office of the Sarasota County Clerk of the Circuit Court and County Comptroller found that, a week before the library incident, Williams was cited for violating the City of Sarasota’s Lodging Out of Doors ordinance. He was found outside City Hall, which stands at 1565 First St. in downtown Sarasota, the citation showed.
He was to be arraigned in that case on Aug. 28, the citation added.