Tarzana : Police Find Grenades, Evacuate 2 Locations

A busy block of Ventura Boulevard in Tarzana was closed to traffic and shops were evacuated for about two hours Thursday after Los Angeles police found a hand grenade in the hotel room of a man fighting with his neighbor, authorities said.

About two hours later, police said they found another explosive device in a suitcase at the corner of Canoga Avenue and Valerio Street, Canoga Park. Police evacuated area businesses and then exploded the device. No one was injured.

The grenade in Tarzana was exploded in a special container. No one was injured, but traffic was jammed for hours around Ventura and Tampa Avenue, and some merchants were unable to open their stores until midmorning.

Jose Duran, 24, who had been living for about a month at the St. George Motor Inn in the 19400 block of Ventura, was arrested on suspicion of having the hand grenade and was held in lieu of $500,000 bail, police said. Duran was also arrested on suspicion of possession of marijuana with the intent to sell, police said.

Officers went to the hotel about 8:30 a.m. to investigate a dispute between Duran and a neighbor. After Duran let the officers into his room, police said, they saw the marijuana in plain view and searched the rest of the room.

Officer Jason Beatty said he was searching a closet when he felt a hard object in the pocket of a coat hanging on a rack. It turned out to be the grenade with the pin still in it, he said. Duran told officers that he bought the grenade because he thought it would be “fun to have it,” Beatty said.

Police evacuated businesses for about a block on the west side of the street and cordoned off Ventura between Tampa and Shirley Avenue and then exploded the grenade.

Sonny Laubhan, who operates Hair In L.A., a hair salon next to the hotel, said he arrived to find his parking lot filled with police cars.

“I thought that we had been burglarized,” he said, “or that we had some vandalism with our windows, which is real common around here.”

He said he lost two hours’ worth of business.