Clare Bagley narrowly avoided death after throwing a nail bomb from her car window which was planted in a chocolate tin found on her porch – and police are still hunting for the person responsible
A woman discovered a nail bomb on her doorstep after opening an innocent tin of chocolates – narrowly escaping death.
Clare Bagley ripped into the parcel left at her door in March 2001, with the pharmacist receiving the package and opening it in the car with her father and sister. Clare, who had been living in Formby, Merseyside at the time of the incident, had been preparing for a weekend away when she received the parcel.
As she lifted the lid of the Galaxy chocolate tin, she found what appeared to be a nail bomb before throwing it out the car. The package had a Liverpool post mark – and a bomb expert later said it would have killed or seriously injured her had the device gone off.
Speaking to BBC Crimewatch in June that year, Ms Bagley said: “I’d never seen anything like it in my life, I didn’t know what a bomb looked like apart from what you see on the television and how accurate that is I don’t know. It had a smell, a bit like fireworks type of smell, and that frightened me more so than the sight of it.”
Police later arrived at the scene to warn residents to stay away from the gold tin that had been thrown from the moving car onto the road in Formby. A driver later clipped the tin while driving before police could cordon the road off, but the bomb thankfully didn’t go off.
A bomb disposal team spent four hours on the scene before making the area safe, Daily Record reported. BBC Crimewatch reported at the time how the bomb contained: “Low power explosive but was sophisticated and packed with nails”.
Ms Bagley continued: “It just feels horrible to think it could have injured so many people, it had the potential to do so much harm. If I could understand why somebody wanted to kill me or if I could see a motive for somebody wanting to kill me maybe I would feel disgusted and upset and sick but I can’t think of any reason and I couldn’t relate to somebody who would want to do that to somebody who as far as I’m concerned is completely innocent. I’ve moved far away from the area, changed my job and I’ve just been trying to put it all behind me.”
Detective Chief Inspector Bob Marsden added: “I think it’s personal, they spelt her name correctly, they gave the correct address, the postal code. This was personal, this was meant for Clare Bagley.” The person responsible for the bomb being sent to the address in Formby was never found despite the reconstruction on BBC Crimewatch and an appeal for information.
