The Latest: Dad: Son with fake bomb thought world was ending

BALTIMORE – The Latest on Alex Brizzi, the man shot and wounded by police after walking into a Baltimore TV station wearing an animal costume and a fake bomb (all times local):

1 p.m.

Authorities say criminal charges have been filed against the man shot and wounded by police after walking into a Baltimore TV station wearing an animal costume and strapped with a phoney explosive device.

Baltimore Police Commissioner Kevin Davis said Friday that 25-year-old Alex Brizzi has been charged with arson, malicious burning, reckless endangerment and possessing a phoney destructive device.

Brizzi walked into the Fox 45 television station just before 1:30 p.m. Thursday wearing a hedgehog suit over a life preserver that was disguised to look like an explosive vest. Police shot Brizzi at least three times. He is in the hospital and expected to survive his wounds.

Police say Brizzi wanted to deliver a flash drive with recorded rants about the end of the world to the station to play on the air.

The man’s father says his son believed the world was ending and might have been trying to get the message out.

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12 p.m.

The father of a man shot and wounded by police after walking into a Baltimore TV station wearing an animal costume and a fake bomb says his son believed the world was ending and might have been trying to get the message out.

Edward Brizzi of Elkridge, Maryland, told news outlets after the shooting on Thursday that his 25-year-old son, Alex, had a breakdown two weeks ago and said he had a vision from God that the world would end next month. His son was shot four times, but is expected to survive, he said.

The man, wearing what police spokesman T. J. Smith said was a panda suit and what employees described as a hedgehog costume, gave a flash drive to a security guard and told him he wanted the station to broadcast its contents. Police later determined that what the man claimed to be a bomb consisted of aluminum-wrapped chocolate bars duct-taped to a flotation device. Smith said police don’t know what was on the drive.

Police said the man barricaded himself inside the station after it was evacuated and his car became engulfed in flames outside as police, fire, arson, bomb squad and SWAT teams arrived. Police don’t know what caused the fire.

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