Homemade bomb blast kills man, locks down neighborhood, California police say

A man found dead near a Northern California high school apparently blew himself up with a homemade explosive, police told news sources.

“Whether it was intentional or accidental, we don’t know,” Officer Darryl Saffold of the Antioch Police Department told KTVU.

Classes were canceled at Live Oak High School and a six-block area remained locked down while police investigated the death Monday, Jan. 31, police reported on Facebook.

Antioch police responded at 7:40 a.m. PST to reports of a man down near the high school, KPIX reported. Officers found the man dead and noticed wires near the body, prompting them to call a Walnut Creek bomb squad for assistance.

No other injuries were reported and no other explosive devices were found, police told KTVU.

“The extent of how this occurred or why this individual did what they did is still being uncovered and we don’t have anything further,” Saffold told KRON.

The Mercury News identified the man as a 62-year-old Antioch resident who had survived an accidental pipe bomb explosion at his home in 2012.

Antioch is a city of 115,000 in the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta.

This story was originally published February 1, 2022 at 11:33 AM with the headline "Homemade bomb blast kills man, locks down neighborhood, California police say."