The proper response would have been:
1. Stop her
2. Inspect the device.
3. Realize it's a bread-board with a battery and some leds
4. Ask her to remove it from sight
5. Turn her loose.
That's not a bomb. It doesn't look like a bomb. It's not being carried how bombs are generally carried (i.e. sewn into pockets in a vest hidden under clothing). There's no way you could hide any explosive in or around that device. After a few questions, any cop with a few working neurons would figure out that she's not a threat. The cops are idiots.
A double tap to the head to make cetain the bomb (hoax or not) isn't detonated.
Case closed.
Perhaps all bomb-like strap-on/clip-on devices should first be run by you, to test for believability. We can just have law enforcement keep suspected bombers under surveillance until you give them the go-ahead to make an arrest.
Or, we could simply let the police stop anyone who’s wearing such a suspicious device, until it can be determined exactly what it is that they’re dealing with.
I hope the jihadists are taking notes from this, and not from those who would have a believability index attached to all play-doh/circuit board devices that are being worn by oddballs in airports.
How should they react if they see someone trying to light their shoelace? Isn’t that just as ridiculous?
And yet, someone did try to use a shoe-bomb, as silly as that may sound.