Posted on 05/04/2008 9:02:09 AM PDT by NormsRevenge
An early morning explosion at the federal courthouse in downtown San Diego left a door damaged and blew out a window.
Sgt. Bob Dare of the San Diego Police Department says the loud blast occurred at about 1:40 a.m. Sunday. Streets in the area have been closed.
No injuries were reported. The explosion is under investigation.
FBI Special Agent Darrell Foxworth told a local TV station it appears the explosion may have been caused by a pipe bomb.
Blast occurred at 1:40 and by 1:41 they’d ruled out terrorism, at least if they follow the usual script.
This is something we'll see in Denver, when the DNC comes to town...
Is there a big trial coming up? If so, what? I don’t know that the San Diego court has a lot of terrorism trials. Possibly it has eco-terrorism trials, since a lot of those are West Coast things. But, usual denials aside, that’s where I’d look. In fact, I think the eco-terrorists are even more likely than the others to do something like this.
Those terrorists are getting sloppy. Someone should inform them that goobermint workers (whom I presume were the intended targets) don’t tend to work in the wee hours of Sunday mornings.
This was a message.
All of whom support Obama for president.
By Angelica Martinez
UNION-TRIBUNE BREAKING NEWS TEAM
11:16 a.m. May 4, 2008
SCOTT LINNETT / Union-Tribune
FBI agents cordone off the blast area while checking for evidence around the courthouse.
SAN DIEGO A pipe bomb or series of pipe bombs exploded at the Edward J. Schwartz Federal Courthouse downtown early Sunday morning, sending shrapnel into a courtyard and to the eighth floor of a building across the street.
Two guards with the Federal Protective Service, who were inside the building, called authorities when they heard the explosion at 1:40 a.m. on Front Street near Broadway. The guards were not injured.
Firefighters, police, FBI and Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms agents arrived minutes later to find the front entrance and the lobby of the building damaged.
The cause is believed to have been a bomb or bombs that detonated at once and caused a single explosion, said Keith Slotter, FBI special agent in charge of San Diego.
Before the investigation began, San Diego Metro Arson Strike Team investigators and ATF bomb investigators searched the area to make sure there were no other explosives.
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Early Sunday morning, about 40 agents combed the courtyard in front of the courthouse, Front Street and a courtyard on the other side, using evidence markers and spray paint to locate debris from the blast.
The damage from the shrapnel didn’t stay concentrated just in front of the door, Slotter said.
One piece of shrapnel lodged in a window about eight stories up the AT&T building that faces the courthouse.
Authorities believe the device or devices were left outside the building’s front door shortly before being detonated.
Slotter said there are cameras outside the building that may provide information. There are no cameras that directly face the doorway, he said.
Authorities were still deciding whether or not the courthouse will be open to the public Monday. They expected to make a decision late Sunday.
Investigators said Front Street, between Broadway and F Street, would be closed until at least noon Sunday while they collect evidence. That evidence will be sent to an FBI laboratory in Virginia, where bomb experts will analyze it, Slotter said. At the time of the explosion, there were not many people walking by the building, which is at least a block from nightclubs in the Gaslamp Quarter. Slotter said there were vehicles passing by when the explosion occurred, but no reports of injuries.
Anyone who saw any activity near the building at that hour is asked to call FBI at (858) 565-1255.
Angelica Martinez: (619) 293-1317; angelica.martinez@uniontrib.com
test
Hey, you left out typical whitey!!!
Who was Edward J. Schwartz ? I didn’t find a lot abut him under search.
It’s due to right wing talk radio shows! Rush Limbaugh’s creating chaos! /s
There are always major ongoing high profile trials going on at the Federal Courthouse in San Diego.
There have been everything from Middle East terror cases over the yrs. to in recent months the Felix Drug cartel.
That's racist! ;~)
“Blast occurred at 1:40 and by 1:41 theyd ruled out terrorism, at least if they follow the usual script.”
I suppose we could rehash the discussion of what is terrorism, but a blast at 1:45 AM on Sunday morning seems to be designed to spread the LEAST amount of terror for the buck.
http://politicalgraveyard.com/bio/schwartz.html
Schwartz, Edward J. (c.1913-2000) of California. Born in Seattle, King County, Wash. Lawyer; served in the U.S. Navy during World War II; municipal judge in California, 1959-63; superior court judge in California, 1963-68; Judge of U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California, 1968-2000. Died, at Scripps Mercy Hospital, San Diego, San Diego County, Calif., March 22, 2000. Burial location unknown.
designed to spread the LEAST amount of terror for the buck.
—
It could just be a test run, looking to determine how much boom dust might be needed at courthouses built of late.
It would be nice to hear they have video of the perp(s).
update on the SD U-T piece from earlier
courthouse is closed Monday
this place has been hit a few times before, once literally..
—
Bomber targets San Diego courthouse
By Angelica Martinez
SD U-T
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/metro/20080504-1532-bn04bomb2.html
SAN DIEGO A pipe bomb or series of pipe bombs exploded at the Edward J. Schwartz Federal Courthouse downtown early Sunday morning, sending shrapnel into a courtyard and to the eighth floor of a building across the street.
Two guards with the Federal Protective Service, who were inside the building, called authorities when they heard the explosion at 1:40 a.m. The guards, who work for a federal agency that is part of the U.S. Deparment of Homeland Security, were not injured.
Firefighters, police, FBI and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms and Explosives agents arrived minutes later to find the front door shattered and the lobby of the building damaged.
The FBI announced Sunday afternoon that the courthouse, on Front Street near Broadway, would be closed Monday.
The cause of the blast is believed to have been a bomb or bombs that detonated simultaneously and caused a single explosion, said Keith Slotter, FBI special agent in charge of San Diego. No threats were made and no one has claimed responsibility, an FBI spokeswoman said.
Before the investigation began, San Diego Metro Arson Strike Team and ATF bomb investigators searched the area to make sure there were no other explosives.
Early Sunday morning, about 40 agents combed the courtyard in front of the courthouse, Front Street and a courtyard on the other side, using evidence markers and spray paint to locate debris from the blast.
The damage from the shrapnel didn’t stay concentrated just in front of the door, Slotter said.
One piece of shrapnel lodged in a window about eight stories up the AT&T building that faces the courthouse. A damage estimate was not immediately available.
Authorities believe the device or devices were left outside the building’s front door shortly before being detonated.
Darrell Foxworth, an FBI spokesman, said surveillance tapes from the cameras that record activity in front of the building will be examined.
Front Street was closed between Broadway and F Street until just after noon Sunday while investigators collected evidence. That evidence will be sent to an FBI laboratory in Virginia, where bomb experts will analyze it, Slotter said.
At the time of the explosion, there were not many people near the building, which is at least a block from the nearest nightclubs in the Gaslamp Quarter. Slotter said there were vehicles passing by when the explosion occurred, but no reports of injuries.
Officials said they don’t know if the bombing is connected to a pipe bomb that exploded at a Federal Express building April 25.
We’re aware of that incident and of course, that’s something that will be considered in the investigation, Foxworth said.
That bomb shattered the glass door of the building, on 47th Avenue near Federal Boulevard, at about 2 a.m. Firefighters found a second bomb in the parking lot and detonated it.
Anyone who saw any activity near the courthouse in the early morning Sunday is asked to call FBI at (858) 565-1255.
The bombing is not the first at San Diego’s federal courthouse.
A homemade bomb sheared off two glass doors in September 1990. It was attached to a container of Freon, which acted as an accelerant, and created a small fire. No one was hurt in that blast.
The courthouse entrance had been damaged before. Dorna Lee Lovelace was convicted in U.S. District Court of destroying government property after driving a pickup truck into the doors in October 1985. She was sentenced to two years in a federal medical facility.
Among the cases that were scheduled at the courthouse Monday is a lawsuit by Grace Church of Rancho Bernardo against the city of San Diego. The church wants to move into an abandoned warehouse in an industrial area, and the city has rejected its plan.
If it was terrorism, it would have been a weekday?
Thinking out loud, any comments?
A pipe bomb blast shattered the glass in the front door of a Federal Express distribution facility in the Webster area Friday and a second pipe bomb was discovered in the parking lot and was safely defused, police said.The blast occurred in the 1600 block of 47th Street and Federal Boulevard at 1:47 a.m., according to San Diego police Sgt. Kerry Tom.
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