The nation’s 232nd birthday party kept police in the capital region busy.

A bomb scare on 15th Street near the White House visitors’ center snarled foot and road traffic for more than an hour after a tourist left a green lunch bag on a wall near the White House.

A U.S. Park Police officer used a bomb-sniffing dog to check the bag and then ended the emergency. But the incident left a sour taste in some revelers’ mouths.

“We’re trying to figure out where to go while the mean policemen are yelling at us,” Catholic University junior Shannon Gasser, 20, of Birmingham, Ala., told The Examiner.

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There were darker moments in the region, however.

Prince George’s County police shut down a section of Pennsylvania Avenue in District Heights around midday Thursday after a pedestrian was struck and killed by a sports utility vehicle. Police had not identified the man as of Friday evening, and his death remained under investigation.

Fairfax County police had an investigation of their own after a passerby found a woman’s body near the Washington & Old Dominion Trail near Malraux Drive in Vienna early Friday.

Police around the region were also trying to stay ahead of those who had too much revelry on July Fourth.

“We want to make sure this is a safe Fourth of July Weekend for everyone,” Prince William County Police Chief Charlie Deane told The Examiner, explaining his department’s sobriety checkpoints.

bmyers@dcexaminer.com, fklopott@dcexaminer.com