Staff Reports
Las Vegas residents woke up on November 13 to a shocking revelation: an improvised explosive device had been placed at the front door of Piero’s Italian Cuisine in the early hours of the morning, burned for minutes and then detonated, yet the first report to police didn’t come until a cleaning crew arrived at 10:36 a.m. — giving whoever did this an eight-hour and seventeen-minute head start to vanish into the crowd. This wasn’t a minor prank or vandalism; it was a deliberate act that damaged a well-known establishment and exposed a catastrophic window in basic situational awareness on a tourist-heavy strip.
Clark County Sheriff Kevin McMahill laid out the unnerving details: two men dressed in all black, one on a scooter, allegedly walked up, planted the device at 2:19 a.m., then left the scene while the device burned and later exploded; as of the latest briefing both men remained at large and federal partners including the FBI are involved. No one was hurt, thank God, but the fact that such a device could be placed in plain sight and go unreported for more than eight hours reads like a security nightmare — not the confident reassurance the public was given.
We should not let the soundbites soothe us. The timeline alone — early-morning placement, minutes of burning, and an eight-plus-hour unobserved gap — suggests either a failure of routine patrols and local vigilance or a calculated effort to exploit the city’s soft underbelly. For a city built on entertainment and tourists, the idea that an explosive could sit and detonate near convention crowds without immediate detection is an indictment of how we prioritize optics over actual safety.
Adding to the alarm, court records show the founder’s son, Evan Glusman, had earlier this year entered a no-contest plea to harassment after allegations he borrowed against the business and threatened violence at the restaurant — a coincidence authorities say they aren’t linking yet, but one the public cannot help noticing given the timing. Whether this connection is real or a convenient red herring, officials owe the public more than vague denials: they owe transparency and a serious, visible manhunt.
Sheriff McMahill told Las Vegans there’s “no reason” to feel there’s a broader threat to the Strip, a line that will ring hollow to any parent planning a family vacation or a business owner who sees how quickly a city’s reputation can be shattered by one amateur or professional act of terror. Federal involvement is promising on paper, but federal boots and buzzwords don’t replace street-level police presence, functioning surveillance, and policies that prioritize the protection of citizens over political optics.
This moment demands consequence and common-sense action: patrols need to increase where tourists and conventions gather, private businesses must be empowered to secure their premises without bureaucratic hand-wringing, and our border and immigration policies must be enforced so we know who is coming and going from cities that host millions annually. Conservatives have been warning for years that a soft security posture invites trouble; this incident proves that warning was not hyperbole but prophecy.
To hardworking Americans — the small-business owners and the families who make Las Vegas thrive — you deserve better than platitudes. Demand accountability from Metro, from the FBI, and from the local officials who are paid to keep you safe; call for a public after-action review, honest answers about how an explosive sat unnoticed for eight hours, and concrete steps that ensure this city’s image of glitz won’t come at the price of your safety.
