PRESQUE ISLE, Maine — Police have not released the name of the man found dead inside a Presque Isle residence, but investigators say he made the bomb that was in the apartment.
Presque Isle police were called to 17 Parsons St. Thursday to investigate the death of a man who lived there. While there, they found a suspicious package that turned out to be a pipe bomb, Police Chief Laurie Kelly said Tuesday.
Police closed off streets in the area, which borders Machias Savings Bank, and called in the Maine State Police bomb squad.
The man’s identity has not been released because relatives have not been notified, but he was believed to have been working in Presque Isle, Kelly said.
Investigators have not released a cause of death.
While local police look into the death, the state fire marshal’s office is investigating the pipe bomb, said Shannon Moss, spokesperson for the Maine Department of Public Safety.
The Maine State Police bomb team retrieved the device and disabled it, Moss said. Fire Marshal personnel determined it was handmade and belonged to the man who died.
The building at 17 Parsons St., which formerly housed Seacoast Security, appears to be divided into three apartments, although police haven’t confirmed that, and no one in the neighborhood seemed to know in which apartment the death occurred. Through the glass at one entrance a head-and-shoulders silhouette target could be seen taped to a door.
On Tuesday, few neighbors on the street were home or willing to talk, but one noted seeing an unknown man leave the apartment building at 17 Parsons St. every day and walk to an apparently vacant building next to Machias Savings Bank.
Wilbur Clark, 68, who lives down the street from 17 Parsons St., said this summer he has seen a man about 6 feet tall and heavyset meet several people outside the vacant building, which previously belonged to the now defunct Aroostook Valley Railroad.
Several cars were parked outside the building Tuesday afternoon, though Clark was unsure if they belonged to anyone doing business there.
He is not certain if the man police found is the same one he used to see, but thought he might be.
Clark was home last Thursday when Presque Isle police began barricading the street. He said officers advised him to leave the area for at least two hours, so he did.
In his 22 years of living on that street, Clark said he never saw police go into the building where the man was found Thursday. As of Tuesday, Clark had not spoken with police about what he had observed in the neighborhood.
Two other neighbors, who did not want to be identified for personal safety reasons, said they did not know who the man was.
He was apparently not from the area, one person said. Police information on the incident has been scant, which makes people uneasy, the other neighbor said.