Police officers took three teenaged boys from the south of the Netherlands into custody for making a bomb threat against the Abe Lenstra Stadium in Heerenveen.
Translation by Traci White
De Volkskrant reports that one of the young men is 13 and two of them are 15. All three of the suspects are from the province of Zuid Limburg. The stadium where the Frisian team FC Heerenveen plays and the surrounding buildings were sealed off for a police investigation last week following a bomb threat, and the police reopened the area after they determined that there was no bomb.
The police carried out an “extensive telecommunications investigation” in order to trace who had placed the call delivering the bomb threat. After being taken into custody, the suspects reportedly described the threat as “a joke that had gotten out of hand”. The police have filed an official report on the incident, and the Dutch Public Prosecutor will decide how to proceed.
An employee at the stadium was told on Tuesday afternoon that a bomb would explode in the stadium the next day. The employee informed the police, who reportedly immediately began investigating who made the call.
The complex surrounding the stadium was cordoned off for hours on Wednesday while police specialists and bomb detection dogs inspected the area. No bombs were found, but the bomb threat was a major inconvenience: businesses and a secondary school on site were also closed off during the investigation.
