‘Piece of trash’ mistaken for pipe bomb triggers brief scare at Las Cruces City Hall

LAS CRUCES, New Mexico -- An item police described as "a piece of trash" was mistaken for a pipe bomb on Wednesday morning, touching off a brief scare at Las Cruces City Hall.

City Hall was evacuated for about 30 minutes as police cordoned it off to investigate the situation before determining there was no threat and allowing employees to return to the building.

"A security guard at City Hall noticed a suspicious looking pipe by the electrical boxes on the east side of the building," said Mandy Gus, a spokesperson for the city manager.

"Upon closer inspection, the pipe turned out to be a container where electrical drawings are held that had fallen to the ground," she explained.

A police detective summed up the incident to ABC-7 by saying: "Negative on a pipe bomb being found. It was a piece of trash that someone mistook for something else."