The 36-year-old man arrested after police closed the A2 motorway on Thursday, fearing a potential attack on a leading Dutch crime reporter, has been released from custody.

The A2 was closed to traffic for nearly an hour with police initially only disclosing the action was prompted by a threat to a person who was under police protection. That later transpired to be Telegraaf reporter John van den Heuvel.

According to media reports, the man who was arrested appeared to have been following Van den Heuvel’s car, prompting his security team to take action.

The man, who has been questioned by police, remains a suspect but there is not enough evidence to hold him, the public prosecution department said.

Van den Heuvel said he had been told a balaclava and several phones, including encrypted ones, had been found in the man’s car.

The incident comes six months after crime reporter Peter R de Vries was gunned down in a busy street in Amsterdam shortly after leaving the studio of TV gossip show RTL Boulevard.

De Vries is said not have wanted police protection because it would make it impossible for him to do his job. It is thought that shooting may have been related to the Marengo gangland murder trial in which De Vries represented key witness Nabil B.