Posted on 02/01/2007 3:16:22 AM PST by billorites
A furious Boston Mayor Thomas M. Menino vowed yesterday to throw the book at the masterminds behind a guerrilla marketing campaign gone amok that plunged the city into bomb-scare pandemonium and blew nearly $1 million in police overtime and other costs.
As city and state attorneys laid groundwork for criminal charges and lawsuits, cops seized 27-year-old Arlington multimedia artist Peter Berdovsky, who posted film on his Web site boasting that he and friends planted the battery-wired devices, and Sean Stevens, 28, of Charlestown. Both were jailed overnight on charges of placing a hoax device and disorderly conduct.
This is outrageous activity to get publicity for a failing show, said Menino, referring to the battery-operated light-up ads for the Cartoon Networks Aqua Teen Hunger Force, which sparked at least nine bomb scares in Boston, Cambridge and Somerville.
Menino promised to sue Turner Broadcasting Co., the Cartoon Networks parent company, and criminally prosecute Berdovsky and anyone else responsible for the devices, and to petition the FCC to pull the networks license.
Attorney General Martha Coakley was put in charge of the case and said the companies behind the promotion would be investigated. She said the felony charge of planting a hoax device could be broad enough to allow prosecution even if the stunts sponsors did not intend a panic.
To do this kind of placement of devices the way it was, an individual had to know or should have that it was going to create the kind of panic it did, Coakley said last night during a press conference.
Panic was the order of the day in Boston as city, state and federal investigators, police and bomb units raced through the city seeking 38 of the devices, in some cases destroying them as a precaution.
Shutdowns affected Storrow and Memorial drives, the Longfellow and Boston University bridges and Interstate 93, while extra Coast Guard patrols were seen at Rowes Wharf and at commuter ferries.
I cannot state strongly enough the seriousness of this offense, said Suffolk County District Attorney Daniel Conley. Commerce was disrupted, transportation routes were paralyzed, residents were stranded, relatives across the nation were in fear for their loved ones here in the city of Boston.
In a statement, Turner Broadcasting said the light-emitting devices pose no danger and are part of a 10-city outdoor marketing campaign for the cartoon program. A Boston police spokesman said the company did not have permits to place the signs in the city.
We regret that they were mistakenly thought to pose any danger, the Turner statment said.
All told, the cost of extra police and activating the citys anti-terror command center will cost Boston $800,000 to $1 million in damages, an angry Menino estimated.
Gov. Deval Patrick said he was not impressed by the apology from Turner Broadcasting.I am deeply dismayed to learn that the devices are a part of a marketing campaign. This stunt has caused considerable disruption and anxiety in our community, he said.
The bomb scare reports began about 8 a.m. when a MBTA worker reported a package with wires and tubes protruding from it that was stuck on a steel girder under Interstate 93 at Sullivan Square Station in Charlestown. The devices, featuring characters with raised middle fingers, had magnetic backs and were affixed to metal.
The reports spread throughout the day to the Boston University and Longfellow bridges, Downtown Crossing, the intersection of Stuart Street and Columbus Avenue, the intersection of Massachusetts Avenue and Memorial Drive in Cambridge, the McCarthy Overpass on the McGrath OBrien Highway in Somerville and at a comic book store in Brighton.
The discovery of two more devices last night at the Massachusetts College of Art prompted another brief evacuation. By the end of the day, investigators had recovered 14 of the 38 devices believed to be placed in the Boston area and urged the public to report the whereabouts of others.
Just after three p.m., two bomb-sniffing dogs swept through City Hall, spending 16 minutes in Meninos office. It is outrageous, in a post 9/11 world, that a company would use this irresponsible marketing scheme, Menino said.
DOH. Should have been "when" the excrement.....
Hey, I resemble that remark!
If it has come to this... then the terrorists have won. Only God can save this nation. If people don't turn back to God, I fear what will happen. More and more people will be willing to submit to a police state. Good bye old American values! Good bye American freedoms! Hello storm troopers and a camera on every corner!
May God have mercy on us and our families...
The Dark Days are coming! Trust in Jesus! The Jesus that died for our sins and rose again 3 days later! Get your life right with God guys! For the sake of you and yoru children... this is gonna be a bumpy ride!
and in all things... good and bad... Praise God! :)
So what you're saying is that if there exists somebody stupid enough to think that some object you've made is a bomb, you should be held criminally responsible?
What's especially sad is that the people *whose job it is to deal with bombs* actually thought these things could be a threat.
Fake bombs? Who planted 38 fake bombs?
I guess if an immigrant making Mooninite figures on a homemade Lite-Brite while acting as a paid employee of Cartoon Network, then placing said Lite-Brites in several cities around the country leads the city of Boston to go on high alert and basically grind commerce to a halt and subsequently label this poor guy as a terrorist mastermind and threaten Cartoon Network with lawsuits out the wazoo . . .
Which then further leads to calls to God and Jesus to save us all, then yeah, we're in bad shape (not a slam on you in any way; as a fan of the Aqua Teens, I just find this episode funny in a sad kind of way).
There is a reasonable possibility that I am wrong. However, I just finished reading a book by a modern-history scholar, Derek Leebaert - The Fifty-Year Wound, that has quite adifferent view of CIA performance during and after the Cold War. The Russians ran circles around us in the espionage arena. Their analysis was not very good though, even though analysis is the reason intelligence is gathered in the first place.
We definitely had less than skillful people somewhere in the mix. Real mental ability has great difficulty insinuating itself into and operating within bureaucratic structures.
"Meatwad made me do it! Because he's a witch!"
It was a advertising gimmick; the expense and inconvenience came when the authorities panicked.
I agree ... some jail time and a bill to Turner Broadcasting for compensation of resources used.
What will they be charged with?
They can't be charged with making hoax bomb threats because they never made a bomb threat. The signs do not resemble bombs, nor were they intended to be seen as bombs.
They can't be charged with trespassing because the signs were all placed in public places.
The most I can think of is littering- one fine for each sign placed. Then again, the DA would have to demonstrate that people and businesses that routinely plaster telephone poles and bus stops with signs and fliers are consistently fined.
The union cops in Boston simply had nothing better to do yesterday.
Was one of those characters flipping the bird? If so, leaving aside the security issues for a moment, why the heck did the folks in Boston want that on display on their streets?
I'm doing all I can to get out of this pitiful state... just a matter of time. But I won't be relocating in NH... or New England for that matter.
Lame.
They didn't make any bomb threats. They didn't make a "device" that looked like a bomb.
Anyone with 3/4 a brain could tell what it was. It wasn't even in a box, everything was out in the open, easy to see what it was constructed of and what its function was.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=doD_VpT_yAY
If true, then they are criminals.
Makes me wonder what attracted the dogs enough that they took 16 minutes in the Mayor's office.
It was beyond stupid. . .it appears dangerously lame attempt at a 'reality cartoon'. (This kind of mentality fits in well with the those of like-mind who thought the 'water-drinking' contest a great 'radio' PR stunt/event.
We all survive the costs of general stupidity; but absolute stupidity is can be life-threatening; according to the 'post-mortems'. . .There should be a price for 'Darwin Award' thinking and I hope those responsible; are made to pay it.
They committed the most unforgivable of crimes -- they made the government look bad.
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