PITTSBURGH (AP) — Five men tried to extort $2.5 million from a businessman by delivering a recorded message telling him that they had poisoned him and would sell him the antidote, police said.
Four men were in custody Friday. The alleged ringleader was still at large.
Police said one of the men delivered a package Feb. 19 to John Burns, owner of a Pittsburgh-area company that services dishwashers and sells cleaning supplies to the hotel industry.
Inside the package was a digital voice recorder with a message stating that Burns had been poisoned and demanding the money within 35 hours.
"I called a friend in the medical industry right away and he said, 'No, that's goofy — that's James Bond stuff.' But you have to take the threat seriously because you don't know where the threat's coming from," Burns said.
Burns called police. He later received calls instructing him how to pay the ransom and others threatening to hurt somebody close to him.