Thousands of protesters, many of them demonstrating against the war in Iraq, marched on Monday through the streets outside the arena where the Republican National Convention is being held, with some smashing windows and battling with the police in clashes that led to more than 250 arrests.

Leanne Wade, 56, of Hillsboro told deputies she confiscated the seal bombs from her friend’s 21-year-old son in Seattle earlier Saturday, then drove them to Hillsboro to turn them in for destruction. Portland’s bomb squad was called in to safely dispose of the explosives.

The US Attorney General for Denver, Troy Eid, said there was no credible or “true threat” against Senator Obama. However, Mr. Eid he could not explain the presence of firearms, including a sniper rifle, body armour and wigs in the suspect’s truck. He said the threats against the presumptive Democratic nominee were “more aspirational than operational”.

According to Denver TV station CBS4, one of the suspects told authorities they were “going to shoot Obama from a high vantage point using a … rifle sighted at 750 yards”. Law enforcement officials told CBS4 one of the suspects “was directly asked if they had come to Denver to kill Obama. He responded in the affirmative.”

The woman’s partner was caught by police with chemicals, equipment and $23,000 in cash. The drug squad found enough pseudoephedrine tablets to make between $15,000 and $60,000 worth of the drug. The woman’s son told police he knew what his mother and her partner were up to after he “watched a cop show about them busting crims”.

The pair of 17 year old youths had added a lawnmower engine, bicycle brakes and a metal frame to the revolving chair - making into a go-kart-like vehicle. They are being investigated over a variety of possible offenses, including defying insurance regulations, driving without a license and violating registration requirements.

After wrongly breaking into the apartment, police proceeded to strike an epileptic father in the head with the butt end of a shotgun and pointed their shotguns at his young children, before admitting their mistake and then raiding the right apartment, which was upstairs.

After allegedly holding up a drug store, John Wilkinson, 24, headed back to his vehicle, which was parked and running in front of the drug store, and discovered he was locked out, police said.

Erica Mason, 21, faces charges of unauthorized use of a credit card after purchasing $10,758 in merchandise for herself at the store where she worked.

Members of the public quickly realised the stolen blue Peugeot outside the shop was the robbers’ getaway car, so one man simply turned off the engine and removed the keys.