The LAPD officers arrested a 60-year-old man for menacing the LGBTQ and Latina communities in a hate-fueled bomb threat. Henry Nolkemper, the man apprehended, phoned a national suicide hotline and laid out explicit threats against the Trans-Latina Coalition and the annual gay pride parade. Plagued by the specter of potential violence, residents breathed a sigh of relief at the swift police action that likely averted a calamity.

According to the LAPD Newsroom, the threats surfaced on the evening of March 28, when "Henry" indicated intentions of bombing the Trans-Latina Coalition's Los Angeles premises on Juneteenth and further conveyed plans to target the city's gay pride parade with fire and gasoline. The gravity of these threats prompted the LAPD's Major Crimes Division to take the helm of the investigation and piece together the caller's identity.

Investigators expeditiously traced the telephone number and engaged Nolkemper in a conversation that led to his identification, but attempts to locate him initially hit dead ends, it was on April 11 that LAPD officers stationed themselves at Nolkemper’s last registered haunt and managed a telephonic negotiation that culminated in his surrender and subsequent arrest. The LAPD Newsroom reported that he was booked on charges including a false bomb threat and held under a probation hold without bail.

The case didn't languish long before desks, as Major Crimes Division detectives presented their findings to the Los Angeles District Attorney’s Office, Hate Crimes Section on April 15. The District Attorney's Office filed charges of making criminal threats with a hate crime enhancement against Nolkemper, thus underscoring the system's low tolerance for bigotry and prejudice masquerading as threats to public safety.