by TChris

On Wednesday, the San Francisco Examiner reported that a "homeless man suspected of planting a bomb at a Starbucks on Monday has not been charged in connection with the case." Today we learn why, from a story in the San Francisco Chronicle: the "bomb" was "nothing more than a flashlight with corroded batteries."

The Examiner story described the bomb as "an explosive with a fuse stuffed into a flashlight." The story also claimed:

The bomb, which police defused on the scene, is currently at an Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms testing facility in the East Bay, ATF spokeswoman Marti McKee said.

It turns out that "defusing" the bomb meant that police shot it with a water cannon. They thought the bomb exploded. But there was no fuse, no bomb, and no explosion.

[Anonymous authorities] said a muffled noise that police heard when the water cannon hit the object, which they took to be an explosion, may have been the sound of a chemical reaction between the water and the corroded batteries.