Elementary Cancels Classes After Bomb Threat; Men Arrested for Impersonating Sheriff's Deputies

Area Patch sites provided the following reports. In all incidents where an arrest occurred, a charge is merely an accusation and not evidence of guilt.

Plymouth-Canton Patch

Canton Public Safety has found Bentley Elementary School to be all clear after investigating a bomb threat at the school Monday morning.

According to P-CEP Director of Community Relations Mary Holaly, a staff member found a threatening note in one of the school's bathrooms this morning that mentioned a bomb. Holaly said she does not know if the note was on a piece of paper or written on something in the bathroom.

The threat was found as students were arriving to school, Holaly said. The children were then taken out of the building and put onto buses to keep out of the drizzle while police searched the building with a K-9. Children were with their teachers on the buses.

Parents were given the option of picking up their students during that time, and approximately 400 were picked up and taken home.

Although the threat was found to be negative, the school day was then canceled since there were only approximately 100 children left at the school, Holaly said.

"All the kids did great. It was a very calm scene. There was no panic or chaos," Holaly said.

The school is watching the remaining 100 children for the day, or parents can still come pick them up.

Novi Patch

A resident on Drakes Bay Drive contacted Novi Police Sunday morning, after finding a 5-foot toy soldier Christmas decoration had been attacked by vandals. 

According to the report, the toy soldier moved and played music. The damage occurred sometime between midnight and 10:30 a.m., when the resident found the body of the decoration in the street and its head in the driveway. 

Dearborn Patch

Two Dearborn residents were arrested on Friday for impersonating police officers, according to the Dearborn Police Department.

Police received a 911 call from the border of Dearborn and Detroit, near Tireman and Wyoming, at around 2 p.m. on Friday, March 8. The caller told dispatch that two men with weapons had approached him, falsely claiming to be Wayne County sheriff’s deputies.

When Dearborn police officers arrived in the area, they spoke with the caller, who explained that he was contracted to work on a home on the 8100 block of Wisconsin Street. He told police that while he was working, a dark colored Chevy Trailblazer pulled up and the driver got out and approached him. The driver, he said, was wearing a black and yellow Wayne County Sheriff’s Department sweatshirt and carrying a visible handgun.

The driver told the man that he was a deputy and questioned him about a dog. The man asked him for identification and stated he was going to call the police, at which point the driver and passenger left in the Trailblazer.

Dearborn police located an SUV matching the description at an oil change business located on the 8700 block of Tireman. The vehicle was empty, but as police approached, they saw a man in a silver Ford Explorer in the parking lot who was wearing a Wayne County Sheriff’s Department T-shirt, a black and yellow hat and a wallet badge on his belt, as well as a silver handgun in a hip holster.

While police were questioning the first suspect, a man matching the original description exited the business.

Police detained both men for questioning.

Officers also spoke with an employee of the shop, who shed some light on the situation. According to the employee, it was suspected that someone at the house on the 8100 block of Wisconsin had taken the business’ “shop dog.” The employees asked the two suspects to get the dog back, believing them to legitimately be Wayne County sheriff’s deputies.

The employee said that the two men came into the shop often, and had always presented themselves as deputies.

Dearborn police arrested both men—identified as 22- and 35-year-old Dearborn residents—for impersonating police officers. They were turned over to the Wayne County Sheriff’s Department, as was all evidence.