Bottle Bomb Rattles Homeowner, Neighbors in Suspected Harassment Case

If, as he believes, a Wauwatosa resident has been targeted for more than two years by a juvenile with a grudge, that situation escalated sharply Sunday morning when a plastic bottle left near the front of his home exploded.

The man had noticed the bottle in his yard early in the morning but thought it was just litter and did not immediately remove it. Police believe that if anyone had been holding the bottle or near it when it exploded, it could have caused serious injury.

According to police reports:

At 8:38 a.m., were called to the area of North 90th Street and Stickney Avenue to investigate a “very loud bang.” The caller said he didn't think it sounded like a gunshot but more like an electrical transformer exploding.

While officers were interviewing the first caller at his home in the 2200 block of North 90th, another call came from half a block away in the 2100 block, where the homeowner said a 1-liter plastic soda bottle left in his front yard some time overnight had blown up.

The man said he had looked out his window early in the morning and noticed the bottle, which appeared to be about half full of a clear liquid, but he thought it was just litter and did not go out to examine or remove it. He said he thought it was odd, though, because littering is unusual in his neighborhood.

At about 8:30, he heard the explosion and ran outside to find shards of the bottle scattered across his yard. Police found the site of the explosion about 10 feet from the house, with snow blown from the ground in a space about 1 foot in diameter.

Officers said that based on the evidence of the blast, the explosion had enough force to cause a “significant amount of injury or property damage.”

Police said Tuesday that after a preliminary investigation, they believed that the device was a simple chemical reaction device made of "a combination of otherwise lawful products."

Police also collected for evidence an energy drink can in the street near the curb that appeared to have been left recently. They also took reports from a number of other neighbors who heard the explosion.

The homeowner said that he had been having ongoing trouble with at least one unknown boy in the area since 2009 when he had yelled at a group of juveniles for knocking over traffic signs near his home.

He had filed four police reports just in the past year for incidents of vandalism and other types of what he believes to be harassment.

He described the boy he suspects as white, 14 to 15 years old, about 5-feet-6- to 5-feet-7-inches tall with a slight build.