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Man charged with bringing pipe bomb on airplane
This is just insaneA Las Vegas man attempted to bring a pipe bomb on board a jet at Long Island MacArthur Airport yesterday morning, federal officials said in court documents. The suspected pipe bomb that was found in Steven Nobles' baggage "could have functioned. It could have detonated," federal prosecutor John Durham said at Nobles' arraignment in U.S. District Court in Central Islip late yesterday afternoon. But Nobles' attorney, federal public defender Randi Chavis, said Nobles, 20, had not intended to harm anyone and inadvertently placed the device in his luggage as he was returning to visit his mother after a year of working on Long Island. Oh, we've all done that at least once, you know. Sources familiar with the investigation said that at this point federal prosecutors and FBI agents do not believe Nobles was bent on terrorism, but, at the very least, displayed poor judgment. I'd say Robert Nardoza, a spokesman for Eastern District U.S. Attorney Benton Campbell, said it was not clear whether the bomb could have gone off accidentally. FBI agents and Suffolk police were still analyzing the device, Nardoza said. Federal magistrate Kathleen Tomlinson denied bail to Nobles, pending a hearing today, saying Nobles "certainly was old enough to take into the account the circumstances under which he was operating this morning." As in 'old enough to fly alone.' According to a complaint filed by FBI agent James McCarthy, Nobles was stopped at 7:28 a.m. by Transportation Security Administration officers during a routine search when they noticed a 7-inch-long knife in his carry-on bag. Nobles was preparing to board Southwest Flight 384 to Las Vegas. That was an accident too. After searching Nobles' bag, the officers then noticed the bomb, McCarthy said. Suffolk Police and the FBI were called and part of the airport was temporarily evacuated. A search of Nobles' luggage found "explosive fireworks, electrical circuit boards, a battery with electrical tape and 14 . . . .22-caliber rounds used in a nailgun to drive nails into concrete," McCarthy said. McCarthy said in the complaint that Nobles told him that "the device in the carry-on bag was a pipe bomb." Nobles also said he "built the pipe bomb using a metal pipe, fuses and gunpowder from M-80 fireworks, smoke bombs and other fireworks," McCarthy said. In addition, the agent said Nobles told him he hoped that when the device went off it would "cause a giant smoke cloud, a flash of light and hopefully a loud noise," McCarthy said. However, Nobles "denied intending to detonate the pipe bomb on the airplane and claimed that he had inadvertently carried it to the airport," McCarthy said. Happens all the time. Posted by: Free Radical 2008-10-17 |
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