Authorities are searching a home on McLaughlin Court, just north of downtown Morgan Hill, for explosive material and bomb-making supplies.
As of 11:30am March 13, the street that spans less than a block and ends in a cul-de-sac was closed with crime scene tape while police served a search warrant. Morgan Hill Police called in the Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Bomb Squad to conduct the search. Santa Clara County Fire District’s hazardous materials team was also at the scene.
The search was prompted by two explosions that occurred less than four hours apart in the area of the McLaughlin Court home March 12, according to Morgan Hill Police Sgt. Troy Hoefling.
About 2:45pm March 12, a nearby resident called police to report “a firework or explosion,” Hoefling said. Officers responded but did not find a source of the disturbance at that time.
Then about 6pm March 12, another resident called to report a “louder explosion” than the previous one, Hoefling said. That caller offered more details, including the sighting of a puff of smoke from a specific residence following the explosion.
Police returned to the neighborhood and contacted the homeowner where the explosion allegedly occurred. Authorities contacted the homeowner in his garage, where officers saw suspicious chemicals and what looked like a small laboratory similar to what might be found in a high school chemistry class, Hoefling said. Officers could not immediately determine what the home laboratory was for, but suspected its purpose could have been to produce explosives or narcotics.
The homeowner was arrested on suspicion of possession of “bomb-making material or explosive ingredients,” Hoefling said. Police are not releasing the suspect’s name until the search of the home is complete. He remains in custody.
Officers determined nobody else was in the home and “backed out” of the area after they saw the suspicious chemicals Monday night, and waited until the county bomb squad was available before continuing a search of the property, Hoefling said.
The Monday evening discovery of possible bomb-making chemicals and other materials led authorities to evacuate the neighborhood. The evacuated residents returned home Monday night, but police asked them to leave again Tuesday morning until the bomb squad completed the search, Hoefling said.
The search of the McLaughlin Court home is expected to be complete by about 6pm March 13, police said.
McLaughlin Court is located about one block east of Monterey Road, and just north of East Central Avenue. The Morgan Hill Pre-School Academy and Shadow Mountain Baptist School, among other commercial properties, are nearby. Britton Middle School about two blocks away, on the west side of Monterey Road at West Central Avenue.
Check back later for updates to this developing story.
