Posted on 10/13/2002 3:36:20 PM PDT by Ranger
True, but the odds sure lean in favor of it being a muslim.
Thanks for having the courage to come right out and say it. It doesn't matter what logic and reason dictate, because we all "feel" that Muslims are evil. Yup. And people can't understand how Hitler gained power...
Funny, I posted a thread about conservatives being logical and liberals being ruled by emotion just 2 days ago. I got overwhelming yeas and here-here's. It would seem I was wrong...
Monday, 14 October, 2002, 14:17 GMT 15:17 UK
Finnish police check DIY bomb website
The device ripped through a packed shopping centre
Investigators in Finland say a young man suspected of killing himself and six other people in a bomb attack on Friday may have learned how to make an explosive device from the internet.
They said they were checking chat rooms to try to find why Petri Gerdt, a shy 19-year-old technology student from a middle-class Helsinki suburb, set off the bomb at a busy shopping centre.
He is said to have spent long hours on a website and chat forum for people interested in chemistry and home-made explosives.
The police is investigating an internet forum... where the participants seem to know both the perpetrator and how to make bombs
Hufvudstadsbladet daily
Police said the home-made device, packed with metal shards, was of an unusual design and they had not yet been able to identify the materials used.
More than 80 people, including many children, were injured in the blast at the three-storey Myyrmanni Shopping Mall in Vantaa.
The suspected bomber was a quiet, basketball-playing loner, who lived at home with his parents and attended a technology college, media reports say.
He had no criminal record and is thought to have acted alone.
Chat room regular
The only suspect in the bombing, Gerdt had the username RC in a Finnish chat room called "Forum for home chemistry", investigators told Reuters news agency.
The authorities have shut down the chat room, which Finnish media said was a forum for discussing do-it-yourself bomb-making.
"RC knew a lot about chemistry and he was an expert at explosives," the chat room host told Finnish national radio news YLE.
The forum's users on Sunday seemed convinced that RC and the bomber were the same person and said he had not visited the chat page since the explosion, the Hufvudstadsbladet daily reported.
Investigators said material taken from Gerdt's home, including a computer and information on bomb making, had linked him to the bombing and pointed them to the chat room and other internet sites that were still being checked.
His family, who live in Vantaa, are said to be deeply shocked and receiving counselling.
"The incident came as a total surprise and shock to them. They had no idea of what was to happen," an investigator said.
Scene of horror
The blast ripped through the shopping centre as thousands were shopping there at about 1930 (1630 GMT), killing six people.
A seventh person died on Saturday in hospital, and about a dozen others underwent emergency surgery.
Eyewitnesses spoke of panic, with blood and body parts littering the scene.
Part of the shopping centre's roof collapsed in the blast, which damaged an area of about 300 square metres (3,000 sq feet).
Metro - Monday 14.10.2002
Shopping mall bomber described as a loner
Chemistry student frequent contributor to bomb-making web sites
Police believe that a 19-year-old chemistry student, Petri Erkki Tapio Gerdt, set the bomb which exploded on Friday evening at the Myyrmanni shopping mall in Vantaa, just north of Helsinki. Seven people, including the suspected bomber, were killed in the blast and more than 70 were injured. The other six victims ranged in age from seven to 39.
The suspected bomber had begun his studies at the Espoo-Vantaa Institute of Technology (EVITech) in late August this year. He lived with his parents in the Tikkurila district of Vantaa.
His fellow students described him as a quiet and withdrawn young man who would sit at the rear of the classroom and who rarely took part in student events.
During weekends he spent much time surfing the Internet. He is believed to have used the pseudonym RC on a number of message boards. RC was a frequent contributor on a message board known as the Forum for Home Chemistry, focusing on pyrotechnics. RC appeared to be something of an expert in the field, and police are still investigating whether or not RC and the bombing suspect are, in fact, one and the same individual.
On Tuesday, three days before the explosion, RC asks other members of the forum to write in to say if they have had any "conflicts with explosives/officials".
"The idea would be to write about accidents, officials, and other fun events. No major accidents have happened to me, but once I had a dream that a police car drove to a detonation site. Good thing I was 'floating' in another direction", wrote RC. The same person used an ominous tag-line or "signature" for his posts: "I ain't a killer but don't push me", and also addressed the question of scatter-bombs in one thread.
After the shopping mall bombing other members of the forum posted messages speculating that RC may have been the bomber.
The forum operates on a server maintained by the Finnish computer magazine Mikrobitti. The magazine's head of new media, Jouni Heikniemi, said that the pages were shut down on Sunday afternoon.
"The pages are closed for now. We do not know yet if the bomber really was one of those involved in the discussion. We will look into the matter on Monday", Heikniemi said.
Police said on Sunday that the explosive used in the bomb, which weighed two to three kilos, was not of a conventiuonal type, nor was it familiar from military use.
Police learned little new information on Sunday, and have not ruled out the possibility that the explosion may have been accidental.
In a search of the suspect's home on Saturday the police found material suggesting that he was involved in the construction of explosives.
The bomb appeared to have been built specifically to cause maximum injury: it was packed with metal pieces, either shot or ball-bearings, causing appalling shrapnel wounds to many of the victims.
Hospital spokesmen have said that none of the more than 30 persons still in care is in any immediate danger, but at the same time many of the injuries are very grave, with the likelihood of some permanent impediment. A number of people lost limbs. The location and timing of the explosion (a clown show was in progress on the main concourse) meant that many families were together at the moment of the blast, and a number of small children are among those still in hospital. A seven-year-old girl was among the dead. Further details of the incident and how things unfolded are provided in our coverage from over the weekend.
The International Edition is also grateful for messages of condolence that have been received by e-mail from all over the world. It is a reflection of the relatively peaceful nature of Finnish society that an occurrence such as this is one of the rare occasions when the country crosses the international news threshold. Given other recent events in Bali, we are indeed fortunate that this incident in Vantaa, horrific though it was, was not a manifestation of organised terrorist activity, in spite of the persistent belief to the contrary held by one online news outlet, CNN, who continued to headline their story "Terrorists blamed for Helsinki blast" until well into Sunday afternoon.
That was from one website I visited... yipes- I'm shocked that more Finns haven't considered terrorism...
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