Man arrested after White House alert over suspicious package

0 Comments | AFP, March, 2006

WASHINGTON (AFP) — A man was arrested after throwing a suspicious package over a White House fence in an incident that put the presidential residence on alert, authorities said.

The package turned out to be inoffensive, but it had led to a security lockdown keeping White House employees and journalists from leaving the building as security officers, using a bomb-detecting robot, investigated the object.

President George W. Bush was not at the White House, having left for West Virginia state to give a speech on Iraq.

The alert lasted more than one hour after the package was thrown over the fence around the White House's vast lawn.

Secret Service spokesman Eric Zahren would not describe the object, but he said it "did not contain any dangerous...