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[Music] % [Music] welcome to True Crime garage wherever you are whatever you're doing thanks for
00:01:46
listening I'm your host Nick and with me as always he's the one who likes all the
00:01:51
pretty songs and he likes to sing along he is the captain thank you thank you thank you it's good to be seen and good
00:01:58
to see you thanks for listening thanks for telling a [Music] friend this week we are very happy to be
00:02:09
featuring birthday Bomb by the amazing Artisans over at Prairie Artisan ALS this is a deliciously complex Imperial
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style aged with coffee cacao nibs vanilla beans and chili peppers then the icing on the cake it's finished with
00:02:26
caramel sauce garage grade 5 out of 5 bottle caps and this week I picked birthday bomb because it is a Citywide
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holiday here in Parts Unknown that's right it is the captain's birthday so happy birthday to you old wise one and
00:02:42
cheers to the captain yeah cheers to that guy wherever he is and cheers to all of you for helping us fill up the
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fridge let's give out some praise and thanks right here right now Captain first up a big cheers to Maggie formerly
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of Columbus currently residing in Scottdale Arizona a big we like your chb to Ashley in Phoenixville Pennsylvania
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next we have a cheers going out to Kim in Crystal Lake Illinois and a big cheers to Christina in San Antonio Texas
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and here's a little cheers to Jeff in Santa Barbara California and last but certainly not least we have a big thank
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you going out to Devin and Angela in Denver Colorado everyone we just mentioned went to True Crim garage.com
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and they helped us out with this week's beer fund for the beer run yeah little birthday bwe Ru in beer run for all of
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our old episodes you can check them out guess what everywhere that you listen to
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podcast and also check out our bonus show called off the Record OTR if you're nasty and that is enough of the business
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all right everybody gather around grab a chair grab a beer let's talk some true crime
00:04:01
[Music] [Music] murder is a broad and fascinating crime people murder for love and for hate some
00:04:43
murder for money others for want of money some people murder in a cold insane rage and some people murder with
00:04:52
the calculating skill of a butcher some people use guns or knives or their hands some people murder
00:05:00
children exclusively or women and some people plant bombs in hight traffic locals and some mail them to specific
00:05:11
targets New York City's mad bomber a case featured here in the garage was about an angry and yes very much a
00:05:20
Madman who terrorized New York City for 16 years in the 1940s and 1950s with explosives that he planted in
00:05:30
public places bombs were left in foam booths storage lockers and restrooms in public buildings including the Grand
00:05:37
Central Terminal Pennsylvania station Radio City Music Hall the subway and the New York Public Library for 16 years a
00:05:47
period stretching back to 1940 the largest most formidable police force in the nation had failed to hustle up any
00:05:54
worthy leads by 1956 the bombers handiwork showed a lethal new new proficiency he declared his deadly
00:06:02
intent in letters sent to newspaper editors each rambling raging letter was cryptically signed
00:06:10
FP desperation drove the police to pursue a course they never before considered in the Department's 111e
00:06:18
history NYPD was going to consult with James a brussle a psychiatrist with the expertise and the workings of the
00:06:27
Criminal Mind a physical evidence could not lead the police to FP maybe emotional insights could since a
00:06:34
physical description of the bomber was unattainable New York police believe maybe Dr brussle could use the evidence
00:06:42
to draw a profile of the bomber's inner self an emotional portrait that would illuminate his background and disorder
00:06:50
Brussel told them that the bomber was a textbook paranoid schizophrenic people suffering from this disorder he
00:06:56
explained May believe other people are trolling them or plotting against them they are typically reclusive antisocial
00:07:04
and consumed with hatred for their imagined enemies for all their derangement they're capable of acting
00:07:11
quite normal until inevitably some aspect of their delusions enter into their conversation the paranoic is the
00:07:19
world's champion Grudge holder Brussel would explain we all get mad at other people
00:07:26
and organizations sometimes but with most of us the anger evaporates eventually the Mad bombers anger does
00:07:34
not once he gets the idea that somebody has wronged him or is out to hurt him the idea stays in his mind the bomber
00:07:43
Brussel continued almost surely operated as a lone wolf paranoids quote have confidence only in themselves they are
00:07:52
overwhelmingly egocentric they distrust everyone an accomplice would be a potential poal
00:07:59
bungler or double Crosser ultimately Dr brussle was correct and his assessment of the evidence which was simply the
00:08:08
bombers actions words and intent this specifically helped NYPD identify locate and apprehend a domestic
00:08:17
terrorist that eluded them for 16 years the mad bomber later identified as George mateski was angry and resentful
00:08:26
about events surrounding a workplace injury he suffered years earlier Russell called his approach Reverse Psychology
00:08:34
today we call it criminal profiling decades later in 1980 after four attacks the FBI created the uni
00:08:44
bomb task force during the 80s they failed to identify the unibomber and then he went
00:08:51
dormant the FED suspected the terrorist could be dead but then the attack started up again and in 1993 things at
00:08:59
the task force were ramping up and a new wave of Agents with differing array of expertise were brought in to work the
00:09:07
case its wouldbe assigned task force agents all received a rather large memo titled major case number 75- unabomb for
00:09:17
well over a decade the FBI and other law enforcement agencies around the US investigated the case they dubbed
00:09:26
unabomb by the mid90s the perpetrator was was the most Wanted serial killer in the United States and he was one that
00:09:33
none of his victims had ever laid eyes on an individual so mysterious and Elusive that he was known only by the
00:09:42
case code name the FBI had given him unibomber since his early bombings were directed at universities and
00:09:50
Airlines unlike the one big crude blast of Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVey and his cohorts the uni bombers attacks
00:09:58
were more like like that of the Mad bombers but unfortunately more destructive and
00:10:04
deadly these bombings were spaced apart this perpetrator could wait and act over
00:10:10
time he was more specifically directed he was clever he was diabolical and his motive was wrapped in layers of
00:10:20
mystery this is true crime garage and this is the case of the unibomber [Music] on Thursday May 25th 1978 Mary Gutierrez
00:10:50
was walking through a parking lot this is in Chicago at the University of Illinois Chicago she is walking minding
00:10:57
her own business when she sees a a package on the ground being the nice helpful person that she is she picks it
00:11:03
up obviously wondering what the package is doing just chilling there on the ground she's looking at it and she sees
00:11:09
that the package is complete with shipping address return address and postage in the form of several stamps
00:11:15
but it's has not been technically mailed yet because the postage has not been stamped indicating that the postage
00:11:21
parcel has been processed so not processed not mailed so what should she do well she takes this parcel to a
00:11:30
mailbox to drop it in and send it along its way but the Box doesn't fit so seeing the return address she thought
00:11:37
I'll notify the sender so she took the package back to her home the return address indicated that the package was
00:11:44
sent from a professor Buckley Christ Jr at Northwestern University in Evanston she tracked down a phone number for the
00:11:52
professor and she calls him they make arrangements for someone to come by and collect the package now a mess messenger
00:11:59
takes the box from the good Samaritan's home to the professor at his office at the University Professor Christ receives
00:12:07
the package sees his name and work address listed as the sender or the return address and the package was to be
00:12:15
shipped to another professor this is at the renier Polytechnic School of Engineering in Troy New York now of
00:12:22
course Professor Christ knows that he has not sent this package to anyone recently he does not recognize the
00:12:30
package nor does he know the professor on the other end in New York where the box is to be sent yeah which would spike
00:12:36
your curiosity yes so alarm bells are going off so Northwestern University Professor Buckley Chris Jr said that the
00:12:44
package seemed strange he did not have any reason by the appearance of this package to believe that he was in any
00:12:50
type of danger but again he said the package seemed strange and he suspected maybe something illegal was going on so
00:12:59
he calls the university Public Safety Officer so unfortunately the officer made the determination to open the
00:13:07
package and the Box exploded upon opening and injured the security officer no one had any idea of where this
00:13:16
package came from or who was responsible for making the bomb and setting this trap so if you haven't already figured
00:13:24
it out this is going to be the very first attack of many but law enforcement will not know this at this time they
00:13:32
would not have any evidence that this is the first of many to come or even the last of several before what they do know
00:13:39
is someone targeted someone else and attempted VIA mail bomb to injure and likely kill someone as well as those
00:13:47
around them your very first objective is to identify the Target and maybe you can
00:13:53
trace this thing back to the sender find out who would want to harm the Target or
00:13:58
kill the Target and that could be the person responsible yeah but here it's a little different cuz you actually have
00:14:04
two Clues because you have a person that they're using as the sender and the victim that's exactly right Captain you
00:14:13
have to wonder just exactly who is the actual Target here first guess it would be the person who was supposed to
00:14:19
receive the package this being the professor at the Polytechnic School of Engineering in Troy New York right but
00:14:26
one does not go to all of the trouble of making a bomb putting together the package and risk of getting caught not
00:14:33
to mention risk of blowing oneself up building and packing this bomb without a super strong desire to quote hit your
00:14:42
target so why not just mail the damn thing why even both with a return address unless you intend this to
00:14:51
mislead the police or did the bomber hope that if he dropped it somewhere someone would return to the sender and
00:14:59
then the sender is the actual Target right or was the bomber worried about being seen and possibly identified so
00:15:06
they just left it out in the open at some random spot so that some good Samaritan would find it and mail it for
00:15:12
them or like the Good Samaritan they tried to put it in a mailbox and it didn't fit then one has to Wonder Could
00:15:17
the bomber not really care who the bomb injures or kills as long as it is someone near the University of Illinois
00:15:25
Chicago and both addresses are simply meant to throw theop off of the trail so ultimately what we have here is an
00:15:34
ineffective attack but a very confusing one at least from an investigative standpoint well and the materials used
00:15:41
in this bomb and in this package they're they're not unique enough to give any clues to law enforcement this is going
00:15:49
to take us to May 9th 1979 a graduate student John Harris at Northwestern University is injured when
00:15:57
he opened a box that looked like a present it had been left in a room used by graduate students so this seems like
00:16:06
a bit of a repeat in a way doesn't it kind of an oddly placed bomb just sort of Left for someone anyone to snag it
00:16:14
and open it up so possibly completely random Target or is it again we have the question of are these random targets or
00:16:23
are they actually targeted victims because again we see Northwestern University as part of this
00:16:32
whole attack right remember in the first attack the package was addressed to be sent from Northwestern University here
00:16:40
it's actually left at Northwestern University to harm someone there yeah and it starts making you wonder if it's
00:16:46
a disgruntle employee or maybe a disgruntle former student or current student and as you pointed out Captain
00:16:53
there's no real way to identify the attacker based off off of the bomb and how it's constructed itself we're
00:17:02
assuming that the bomber putting these together was wearing gloves because there's no fingerprints left on any of
00:17:07
the material yeah they're not able to pull anything as far as forensic evidence off of these first two bombs
00:17:14
and in fact because the first one was going to be mailed you know it had the postage and all that already on it the
00:17:23
investigative lead on that particular attack was actually the United States Post service of course they had local
00:17:30
authorities working on both of these cases as well but they have the lead and it sounds to me that even though they're
00:17:37
not able to identify the attacker or the bomb maker based off of the construction
00:17:43
of these two bombs themselves it sounds to me like they were able to figure out that they were
00:17:50
in fact connected to one another they were linked and I will get into that later on
00:17:56
the suspicions of why maybe it is the actual construction of the bomb itself but the nickname that they were giving
00:18:04
the bomber at the postal service was the junkyard bomber because most of these items that were used to construct both
00:18:12
of these two bombs were just I mean they were crude unsophisticated bombs basically and these were items that
00:18:20
somebody could find at your local junkyard yeah or items that they were also suspecting somebody could actually
00:18:28
if they were handy at all they might have some of these items just laying around their house and some of the
00:18:33
pieces and and devices that were inside of these two bombs were handmade were were constructed themselves so yeah I
00:18:41
think there was probably something similar between the first one and the second one where they go okay this we're
00:18:47
dealing with the same individual on Thursday November 15th 1979 we have an attack on a large passenger commercial
00:18:55
airplane this is some scary [ __ ] right here American Airlines flight 444 flying from Chicago to Washington DC
00:19:05
this is a 727 jet with 78 people on this plane 72 passengers and six crew members
00:19:12
M the plane left Chicago at 8:25 a.m. going to DC and as they approach the capital these 78 people they hear a
00:19:22
muffled explosion on the airplane so we are still mid flight up in the air when a small bomb explodes
00:19:32
now it looks like this explosive device thank God did not do what it may have been intended to do right however the
00:19:40
passenger cabin fills with smoke after this bomb detonates in the luggage compartment the pilot brought the plane
00:19:48
down early at Dallas International Airport several passengers suffered smoke inhalation now this is super
00:19:56
fascinating though to me Captain a few few hours after the attack a caller and I'm assuming here captain that it was
00:20:04
all the same caller but a caller phoned four Chicago News organizations one of them being the Chicago Tribune and in
00:20:12
the Tribune it was reported that the caller claimed to be a representative of an Iranian student group so this
00:20:19
so-called group is claiming responsibility for this attack and threatening additional attacks the
00:20:26
caller states that other bombs might be placed in shopping areas and on the CTA that's the Chicago's train line the
00:20:35
subway system okay so this so-called Iranian student group they're making these threats because they're upset that
00:20:45
America is making efforts to try to deport Iranian students which this makes a lot of sense because look it's no
00:20:54
secret that relations between Iran and America seldom have been good at times and they've been downright
00:21:01
disgusting in fact all of the 70s was practically a nightmare between the two and at times most of the world vers the
00:21:08
Middle East were were just bad there was Black September the 72 Olympics and just
00:21:14
before this airplane bomb then there was the threat from this group Iran took over the US Embassy in tran and took us
00:21:23
diplomats hostage and then the US froze Iran's ass s so it's already this is all
00:21:31
very big news at the time so it's a big mess of what's going on between the relations between the two countries so
00:21:38
this threat is easily believable however you heard that that amazing guy in today's trailer leading
00:21:47
into the case this is about the unibomber so we know that that's the direction we're going here right that
00:21:54
trailer by the way was a combo of some of my own writing mixed with the writings from the book incendiary by
00:22:00
Michael canel and the anatomy of motive by John Douglas and Mark all Shaker two books featured on our show before and
00:22:08
two must own books for hardcore True Crime garages now to be perfectly clear here Captain even though the explosive
00:22:17
device did not do what it was supposed to do this was really a very dramatic event I mean imagine you hear an
00:22:26
explosion the cabin filled with smoke the oxygen masks drop down the passengers are leaving their seats and
00:22:34
running to the back of the plane well let me remind everybody fix your mask before you try to help your children
00:22:41
with their mask the crew is forced to make an emergency landing they Evacuate the plane plane from the rear
00:22:49
firefighters and fire trucks are there to greet the plane upon Landing they have to cut away a a small section of
00:22:57
the plane and spray everything down with foam to put out the fire There's an actual fire
00:23:04
on this plane right so I mean some truly heavy heavy stuff here now it was determined that the bomb was from a
00:23:13
small package that was being mailed to the greater Washington area so the plane is transferring not only passengers but
00:23:23
male as well on this trip everybody's seen Tom Hanks and passed away it was a fairly small explosive device with a
00:23:31
battery and an timer which is an instrument that measures altitude so this instrument could trigger the bomb
00:23:40
as the plane was climbing an altitude okay so the the previous attacks are investigated at the local level and with
00:23:50
USPS right however an airliner bombing is a federal crime so here we go bring in the feds and as Nick Cage would say
00:24:00
this whole place is a crime scene well he said there's roughly about 80 passengers or so I don't know if that's
00:24:06
full capacity but they believe that if this bomb would have worked correctly it would have killed every single passenger
00:24:14
on that plane that's correct I mean we're talking about a huge death toll and just a a security nightmere too at
00:24:22
the end of the day for the entire country well this really UPS the anti but I don't think way do they know that
00:24:29
these University of Northwestern bombs are connected to Flight 444 right that's going to take some
00:24:37
investigating and the short of it for this attack is that someone mailed an altitude sensitive
00:24:44
bomb to be on this airplane on a flight from Chicago to Washington DC and again 78 people who got lucky
00:24:56
that the manufacturer of this bomb was unable to get it to be quote successful yeah and now we got the feds on the case
00:25:06
and and hope hopefully we get Julius Pepperwood on the case as [Music] well this show is sponsored by better
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[Music] that all right we're back cheers mates cheers to you Colonel cheers to you
00:27:32
Captain happy birthday all right I'm 21 he's 21 but been drinking on the show for five years and a and a half 21 and a
00:27:41
half all right l capy 10 we have another attack this one is on June 10th 1980 this is a targeted attack on United
00:27:50
Airlines president Percy wood who was injured when he opened a package containing a bomb the bomb was disguised
00:27:59
even inside of the shipping box the explosive device was encased in a book called The Ice brothers by Sloan Wilson
00:28:07
so the book was hollowed out with the bomb inside you open up the book and the bomb goes off the package was addressed
00:28:15
and shipped to Percy wood at his home and that is in fact where he opened the box as said Percy was injured on his
00:28:23
hands face and thighs when the package exploded but thank y he was not killed during this attack so we have two bombs
00:28:31
that are connected to universities and two bombs that are connected to Airlines this is the fourth bomb in our series
00:28:39
now of course we know that the FBI they're already on the job but with this new attack they are going to bring in
00:28:47
John Douglas who ultimately would be just one of many FBI profilers who work the uniom case I think captain at one
00:28:55
point in this investigation the FBI had about 150 agents actively working the case all at the same time this does not
00:29:04
include all of the local law enforcement agencies working the case throughout the
00:29:09
years as well now the agents working this attack they're going to need to clue Douglas in on their assessment of
00:29:16
the situation that is as follows one the United Airlines has not received any threatening letters or phone calls and
00:29:25
neither has Percy would or his family so there was no indication beforehand that
00:29:31
this attack was going to happen there was no request for money or any type of extortion going on with the airline or
00:29:38
with the Wood family themselves I mean this guy's pretty well to do two the airline has not received any Ransom
00:29:45
demand three there was no obvious motive in this case or now the other three cases as well and for the agents in
00:29:56
charge do not believe that this is the first bomb that this attacker has mailed or placed okay Captain so no threats and
00:30:04
no Ransom that's pretty self-explanatory stuff right so anything you want to explore there captain or should we
00:30:14
continue because I really want to get into numbers three and four no apparent motive and not the first attack or
00:30:20
question mark first attack well it's interesting because when you don't have a ransom there's less evidence and like
00:30:28
we said be before with these bombs in particular there's just no evidence Left Behind fingerprints or or DNA that we
00:30:37
know of or any markings to to even suggest that it's even the same bomber other than it seems like random items
00:30:45
found around somebody's house or toolshed or junkyard and these are extremely handmade bombs and what I mean
00:30:54
by that is even the mechanisms and devices the workings inside of the bomb itself a
00:31:00
lot of those are handmade as well and so this is someone who is very meticulous to be able to construct all of these
00:31:09
items construct these bombs and not leave any type of fingerprints or forensic evidence on the bomb itself
00:31:18
plus you then have to package this baby up and ship it off and you've not left any forensic evidence on the packaging
00:31:26
as well now I think this is a good opportunity to take a deep dive into a little
00:31:32
analysis of violent crime study from the crime classification manual this will be
00:31:38
good because it very likely ties into our case from last week as well the timers or the Tylenol murders where we
00:31:46
ask the question was the motive a form of public terrorism or extortion or both or simply just a motive to kill so the
00:31:57
classification here would be non-specific motive killing a non-specific motive killing pertains to
00:32:04
a homicide that appears irrational and is committed for a reason known only to the offender it subsequently may be
00:32:12
defined and categorized after more extensive investigation into the offender's background here are the
00:32:19
defining characteristics of such a homicide first we have the victimology the victims of a non-specific homicide
00:32:27
are random with no direct relationship between victim and offender victims can be male female adults or children and
00:32:35
demonstrate a disparity of characteristics and lifestyle here as you pointed out
00:32:41
Captain the interesting thing with our with our bomb attacks right is while the individuals who are opening these
00:32:49
packages and being injured by the result of these bombs while they might be fair
00:32:57
random you've already put together that in the first two we're seeing a link to universities specifically Northwestern
00:33:05
University and both of them and then the second the third and fourth attack I'm sorry airlines American Airlines and
00:33:13
United Airlines so what what I think you're seeing here is less about the individual and maybe more about the
00:33:21
overall organization themselves yeah there is some some kind of connection there and it's not just like we see in
00:33:29
other cases where they're random victims or if you look at the the time MERS that
00:33:33
you just put bottles on the shelf and whoever gets them gets them so it's not it so it's tough because we we're not
00:33:44
seeing the direct link from this terrorist to the victims but there is a link there and so far there's no
00:33:54
communication there's no one claiming responsibility there's no one asking for money or demands and again it makes it
00:34:03
just extremely difficult now the frequent crime scene indicators of such a crime would be that it's usually a
00:34:13
public place okay of course we've seen that in three of these four attacks so this poses a high risk to the offender
00:34:21
there is nothing missing from the crime scene itself it is disorg organized with
00:34:28
no effort having been made to conceal the victims so obvious thing here you send a
00:34:35
bomb place a bomb whoever it affects or kills that's the result you're not hiding the victims afterwards a firearm
00:34:44
the weapon of choice is is typical with this type of offender this is what we we're talking about here Captain is just
00:34:55
like in the Tylenol murders totally random victims just like with a lot of these bombs totally random victims with
00:35:02
the exception of Percy wood but this also would talk and cover about the like a public shooter a a school
00:35:15
shooter or unfortunately what we've been seeing in the news too often lately people shooting at workplaces or out in
00:35:23
public places the firearm as indicates would be the choice of weapon for this type of Fender is brought to the crimes
00:35:32
now the crime often becomes a massacre because it is the offender's goal to kill as many people as possible I think
00:35:40
that's what we saw with the possible successful attack on the American Airlines flight 444 yeah this
00:35:49
is reflected by the use of weapons that the uh that offer optimal lethality by multiple weapons and by an
00:35:58
abundance of ammunition now the crime scene staging is not present because it's not necessary there's no reason for
00:36:04
the offender to Stage the crime scene as pointed out most of the time these are totally random victims and typically
00:36:12
this type of crime is almost exclusively committed during daylight in public places which we had in the first three
00:36:19
of these four attacks because the offender wants the highest death toll possible one the witnesses often are a
00:36:26
ailable to identify the offender as he is unconcerned with being identified this is interesting because
00:36:35
in the first two attacks these bombs weren't really even mailed they were placed somewhere right
00:36:43
somebody anyone could have spotted someone placing this bomb in the parking lot where the first bomb was found or in
00:36:51
the um university where the second bomb was F it's pretty easy easy to just drop off
00:36:59
a package as you're walking and not be seen oh yeah yeah I would agree with that I think that the thing that would
00:37:07
be alarming is that it looks like a package with intent it looks like a package that is that has a purpose and
00:37:15
to see somebody randomly just place it on the ground in a parking lot I think would be something that would be
00:37:22
abnormal you'd think that the bomber would you know you have to worry about a couple me one bending down and placing
00:37:29
the the the bomb on the ground uh the bomb going off but really you know these are a big enough box that you would then
00:37:38
have eyewitnesses that just saw an individual carrying a box it might not be the bomb but that could be a lead to
00:37:45
the bomber typically in this type of crime the offender really has no escape plan
00:37:53
because they are fine with either committing SU suicide or being shot at the scene by police now Douglas will go
00:38:01
on to say that the offender usually has a disheveled appearance is withdrawn demonstrates an isolated effect and
00:38:09
possibly exhibits erratic Behavior and the search warrant suggestions should one get that far in their investigation
00:38:16
are as follows search the home of the suspect for weapons receipts and Records remember we are handpicking these
00:38:27
particular items in the search warrant itself if it's not written in the warrant it's not seizable evidence so
00:38:35
he's suggesting you want to include weapons receipts and Records this is because you are looking for especially
00:38:43
in this case this week right bomb making materials and then last week's case poisoning bottles of pain reliever
00:38:52
you're looking for evidence obvious or a paper trail because in both cases we have someone manufacturing the death
00:38:59
instrument the bomb the poison bottles somewhere before the attack well on the fact that all these bombs are a little
00:39:06
different it's not the same exact bomb and like they're telling us I mean we we don't have pictures of each of the inner
00:39:13
workings of all these bombs but they're telling us these items could be found around your house they could be found in
00:39:18
the junkyard so you would almost think that the individual would have to write out their idea of how to create this
00:39:25
bomb and so there'd be some kind of uh diagram or some blueprint for the bombs because they're all different and and if
00:39:33
they don't take it that serious they could blow themselves up right and often that's what happens in these cases and I
00:39:40
can't remember if we talked about this last week or not but in poisoning cases especially when you're trying to poison
00:39:45
the masses like with with timers and with bomb cases especially when you're trying to bomb the masses like we're
00:39:53
seeing here they often either poison them themselves injure themselves or blow themselves up one could only hope
00:40:00
to be so lucky when you have a case like this that's going to span the course of
00:40:06
years so of course as you pointed out the the bombs are different well why are the bombs different because the bomb
00:40:13
maker is learning and you're exactly right Captain you would anticipate finding not only diagrams and notes of
00:40:20
how one constructed the last bomb but also thoughts and ideas on how to better construct the next bomb this is kind of
00:40:30
a work in progress for this bomb maker yeah I agree and you pointed out the home items found around the home or or
00:40:37
junkyard or what have you inside of these bombs we're talking about things like you're going to find like pipes
00:40:43
Springs wires a lot of wood was used in the construction of these bombs which I don't know if that's super typical in
00:40:52
these types of situations but you're also finding batteries a lot of these bombs were powered with with everyday
00:41:00
batteries duracel Energizer stuff that you would find at at most people's homes so of course you're hoping to find
00:41:06
physical evidence of such if you get a guy that you like as a suspect when you go to search his home or his place of
00:41:15
work because in the poisoning and in the bomb making especially with the bomb making this is timec consuming Activity
00:41:22
one would need a decent level of privacy to be constructing these bombs if not he
00:41:30
could be turned in Fair fairly quickly by anyone who is aware of what this guy is up to so what we do know is like what
00:41:37
what you're saying this guy needs privacy he needs a workshop he needs maybe he's a a mechanic and he can do it
00:41:44
at his job but then you go but he doesn't need a lot of money because the materials don't cost a lot but he has to
00:41:52
be somewhat intelligent or at least mechanically incline because we don't hear of anybody accidentally blowing
00:42:00
themselves up and like you said we see um the sophistication level of the bombs growing by by each turn now this is not
00:42:10
the first attack obviously and it sounds like they being law enforcement were able to link these attacks together
00:42:17
mostly based off of what kind of bombs they were seeing which again was mostly crude pretty unsophisticated handmade
00:42:25
bombs but you're going to recognize that the construction is somewhat similar and
00:42:30
materials are somewhat similar even though as the captain pointed out the bomb maker is getting better at
00:42:36
constructing these bombs but each one in the series each one of these bombs in the series they're getting a little more
00:42:44
advanced than the last and the bomb maker is putting FC FC on the bombs football club that's
00:42:54
right the uh Washington football club yeah no the uh whoever was making these bombs was going out of their way to
00:43:03
stamp into a piece of metal inside the bomb or on the bomb itself the letters FC well there's your sign right I mean
00:43:12
so even if you even a lay person can look at four bombs and go well somebody stamped FC in these that must mean
00:43:20
something yeah yeah I even I could figure that out you got to get up pretty early in the morning yeah we didn't even
00:43:26
have to turn on the computer to figure that one out now the interesting thing here
00:43:32
though is nobody seems to know what FC stands for and of course you know that they're linked because they've not
00:43:39
publicly announced that hey the bomb maker is putting FC on these bombs so if there's a copycat out there it's not in
00:43:48
these four situations because the copycat wouldn't know to put FC on the bombs right so the FBI was holding
00:43:56
brainstorming sessions trying to dream up what FC could stand for did they have any guesses of what they thought it was
00:44:04
oh the the list was incredibly long I thought about including some of them here but I don't know they i' just be
00:44:10
interested to see some of them were really farfetch um like obviously they they thought maybe it could be
00:44:16
somebody's name so you know Francis you know uh cockburn or something well and not only someone's initial but then like
00:44:27
some kind of organization some kind of group right because usually one thing that we didn't include in that that
00:44:34
classification and that that profile of this type of crime but when you're going
00:44:39
to profile this type of offender and you would have the same thing with the Tylenol murders case even when these
00:44:46
individuals are acting alone often they want to present the idea that they are a
00:44:52
group a a gang an organization they want for faction they want to seem bigger larger more threatening than what they
00:45:00
actually are on October 8th 1981 a bomb wrapped in brown paper and tied with a string is discovered in the
00:45:10
hallway of a building at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City the bomb is safely detonated without causing any
00:45:19
type of injury now this is interesting captain and I don't know the exact details here but I'm not sure if this
00:45:26
bomb was simply just lying on the floor tied together with a string or if the bomb was actually tied to something
00:45:34
because the description I found didn't State either way and what I mean by that is remember the mad bomber case he would
00:45:42
put his pipe bombs inside of a wool sock because the sock you could tie it to something or hang it from something
00:45:51
because you want the bomb up off of the ground right right you know you want to hang that thing so up to like shoulder
00:46:02
level eye level maybe even higher because if it's lying on the ground you are practically shielding half of the
00:46:08
bomb if that's if that thing is off of the ground you can pretty much spray shrapnel 360° causing as much damage as
00:46:18
possible and often it is the shrap nail that kills rather than the actual blast so this being the fifth attack like we
00:46:26
said we thought he was getting more sophisticated but we have no injuries of this one so I mean good for the public
00:46:35
but bad that he's continuing to continue on his bombing campaign right on the the
00:46:41
bomb itself while it may have been more advanced than the previous bombs it may just have been detected and somebody was
00:46:48
smart enough to identify it for what it was now on May 5th 1982 a a bomb was sent to the head of
00:46:57
the computer science department at Vanderbilt University this was not opened by the
00:47:03
department head but by their assistant the bomb was sent to Patrick C fiser but fiser was on vacation in Puerto Rico at
00:47:11
the time and his secretary Janet Smith she ends up suffering several injuries to her hands and face after she opened
00:47:19
the package in his office on July 2nd of the same year 1982 a package bomb is left in the breakroom of Corey Hall at
00:47:29
the University of California Berkeley this package explodes and injures an engineering Professor I think this bomb
00:47:38
Captain was just a small simple bomb right this one actually looks like it was a bit of a step back as far as being
00:47:46
you know more advanced than the others this one was a small simple bomb that was made out of a like a little cigar
00:47:52
box well then we have nothing so then we want Wonder does this guy like to smoke
00:47:57
the cigar well then we have nothing almost for almost 3 years then in May of 1985 another bomb was placed again in
00:48:08
Corey Hall at the University of California Berkeley this injures another engineering student and I'm guessing
00:48:15
that there's again items that that look familiar or the style which these bombs are made look familiar but I'm also
00:48:24
guessing that all the these bombs were finding the tag FC on yes the bomb maker is stamping little pieces of metal with
00:48:33
FC and placing them in the bombs it's the bomb maker essentially putting his signature his calling card
00:48:40
on an indestructible piece a piece that he knows is going to survive the blast fire crotch in or on the bomb he wants
00:48:49
the FBI and everyone else for that fact to know look this is me I am still here I am not dead I am not in prison and I
00:48:58
am not going away first we're seeing attacks on universities and then to Airlines and now we're back to attacks
00:49:07
on universities and two in a row at California berkele yes so whoever's doing this is comfortable in that
00:49:16
setting getting close and just placing these bombs in that area well again this is kind of um a tell here because we
00:49:24
have we do have like we said before multiple people that they're sending to in the
00:49:31
University of Northwestern which is in Illinois and now we're all the way in California so does this um terrorist
00:49:44
does the bomber have connections to Chicago and to Berkeley right and the thing here too is with these last two
00:49:54
bombs they're placed or believed to have been placed in this Corey Hall which I I'm not familiar with the campus itself
00:50:02
but I'm assuming that this is a relatively open accessible building I mean I can't believe that
00:50:11
it's a student or faculty member that is placing these bombs there right this is
00:50:16
going to take us to June 13th 1985 and what I think we're seeing here Captain is the start of maybe a busy year here
00:50:25
for our attacker so this is when a suspicious package was sent to Boeing fabrication to their fabrication
00:50:35
division in Washington this sounds to me like this one was spotted and detected and identified for what it was a bomb
00:50:45
because we have no death we have no injuries in this attack attempt and the bomb is safely
00:50:53
detonated so we have a second occasion where someone is able to identify the bomb as an as a bomb before it triggers
00:51:03
the mechanism to explode yeah see I'm just not that bright I mean and maybe it's because we get so many more
00:51:10
packages now than they got back in the day but it's like I get boxes to my house all the time and I I just open
00:51:19
them up I don't think twice about it yeah that's one thing that I considered when researching this case you know I
00:51:26
know my neighborhood and and most people's neighborhoods the Amazon little trucks
00:51:33
and vans are are frequent flyers in those areas and constantly just placing boxes on doorsteps and and front porches
00:51:44
heck we are subscribers and we advertise things like hellofresh and butcher box and first Leaf wine club and things like
00:51:53
that on this show all showing up up in boxes right at people's homes and every time I cut open that box from first Leaf
00:52:00
I go thank God it's wine and not a bomb yeah well I mean I guess the I guess the
00:52:04
difference is that you do see the the shipping labels and you you see who it's coming from and in a couple of these
00:52:12
attacks the guy didn't even bother to mail it yeah of course this was mailed here for the Boeing attack the attempt
00:52:18
on Boe but in some of these attacks they're just leaving these random packages where curios kills the cat
00:52:26
thankfully no one's been killed but there's been people been injured by opening or handling a random package
00:52:34
that they find somewhere it's like too cheap for uh stamps on November 15th 1985 a University of Michigan psychology
00:52:44
professor and his assistant were injured when they opened a package containing a
00:52:49
three ring binder that had a bomb inside now this was Professor James McConnell and research assistant Nicholas sunno
00:53:00
they were both severely injured after sunno open the mailbomb addressed to McConnell so again University again a
00:53:10
package addressed to a specific Professor well again now we have to go even further does this individual have
00:53:18
connections uh to Northwestern to the University of Michigan to C or Berkeley in California the bomber not
00:53:30
only indicates that he is specifically targeting Professor McConnell by addressing this package to the professor
00:53:38
but also the bomber included a letter with this package asking the professor to review a student's Master thesis so
00:53:47
taking it anep extra step further Captain addressing it to your target but also not wanting this item to just kind
00:53:55
of sit there randomly this is a letter to encourage the professor to open up the binder
00:54:03
because the bomb is disguised as a thesis in a three- ring binder simple bomb the three- ring binder is a little
00:54:10
larger than some of the previous packages that means it can be a little larger of a bomb a little more
00:54:16
destructive but again a simple action to trigger the bomb take the binder out of
00:54:20
the package open the binder binder goes boom thankfully no one is killed in this
00:54:26
attack on December 12th 1985 the Sacramento B newspaper ran the following news article the title is
00:54:37
Mystery blast kills Capital Merchant in the article reads A Sacramento businessman was killed
00:54:44
yesterday when a bomb that had been left behind his store blew up in his face the
00:54:50
blast shortly after noon mortally wounded Hugh Campbell scrw age 38 owner of rentech computer rentals
00:54:59
in Sentry Plaza this located on hoe Avenue in Sacramento this is a little bit of a left turn I mean we have
00:55:08
Airlines we have universities now we have a technology store the device exploded just moments after scrutin left
00:55:18
his store through the back door and headed for the parking lot according to reports the blast blew scrutin about 10
00:55:25
ft the first person to arrive at the scene heard the victim cry out oh my God help me and scrutin was pronounced dead
00:55:34
at 12:34 p.m. at the University Medical Center he reportedly took the full force
00:55:41
of the blast in the chest there were no known witnesses to this crime the blast shook the entire
00:55:49
shopping center and shrapnel was scattered up to 150 yards from the point of the explosion shrapnel penetrated the
00:55:58
store's rear wall but no one else was hurt no motive for the bombing has been established and there are no known
00:56:09
suspects they said law enforcement said that it's possible that scrutin was not the intended victim this according to
00:56:16
the head of the sheriff's Homicide Bureau in Sacramento investigators noted that the rear of the shopping Center has
00:56:25
a series of back doors and identifying which door is for which store would not be easy with the doors that close they
00:56:33
said how do you know which door belongs to which business no suspicious activity
00:56:39
was reported by the merchants at the shopping center and interviews with employees did not turn up any
00:56:45
significant leads in this case obviously looking at these bombs afterwards that's
00:56:50
we're going to lose some evidence with inside the bombs because they actually exploded loed they actually worked but
00:56:56
again are we seeing the signature FC in this bomb as well or are they not telling the public at this point that
00:57:04
this one's connected to the other ones well that's a good question because they're not really cluing us us being
00:57:11
the public in on everything that they seem to know about the bombs the making of the bombs or who is making and
00:57:19
sending and leaving these packages now on February 20th 1987 another bomb was left in the parking lot of a Salt Lake
00:57:28
City computer store so again Salt Lake City again a computer store or tech tech type
00:57:36
store the bomb this time severely injures the business owner's son but we have something very different
00:57:45
here Captain one of the employees at that store working at the store that day saw a man leave the package and from
00:57:54
that that witness account we can create a composite sketch of the suspect all right so now we're we're going to at
00:58:01
least make some Headway here this led to a widely distributed sketch of the suspect wearing a hooded sweatshirt an
00:58:09
aviator sunglasses and the suspect is sporting a mustache now do you think captain that
00:58:16
this is probably one of if not the most well-known suspect composite sketch of all time yeah yeah or at least In Our
00:58:26
Lifetime that's for sure yeah I couldn't think what of one on the top of my head
00:58:32
that that would be even closely comparable so they were Distributing a few different versions of this uh hold
00:58:41
on DB Cooper is pretty popular that's true as far as a u composite sketch they were Distributing a few different
00:58:50
versions of this uh composite sketch for the public to see again it was very widely distributed at the time and would
00:58:58
be for years to come but one of the early ones I wanted to take it sometime here and read what is on this actual
00:59:05
wanted poster they were offering a $50,000 reward and stated that the suspect was wanted by the postal
00:59:12
inspection service for mailing or placing an explosive device and it goes on to say that on February 20th 1987 a
00:59:20
package exploded at a computer business in Salt Lake City Utah bombs have been either received in the mail or placed in
00:59:29
the following states so they have somehow connected all of these according to this wanted poster at the time bombs
00:59:38
have either been received in the mail or placed in the following states Utah Pennsylvania Illinois California
00:59:45
Michigan and Washington my my gut is telling me that there's there's the signature FC on all of them again I
00:59:53
believe you on that 100% Captain I think this guy he wants the investigators to know that they're all connected he wants
01:00:02
credit for the attacks and he wants them he wants the threat of them knowing I'm
01:00:09
not going away I'm going to keep doing this it also goes on to say that the incident has been linked to 11 other
01:00:18
incidents which have occurred across the United States since 1978 injuring 21 people killing one
01:00:26
person the description is given of the suspect and is as follows we're looking for a white male 25 to 30 years old 5'
01:00:36
10 in tall to 6t tall approximately 165 lbs slender build blond reddish hair with a light mustache and Rudy
01:00:48
complexion which I was not familiar with what that means but I always what does that mean I always thought people were
01:00:53
saying Ruby complexion because I looked up Rudy complexion and it means like reddish color uh Rosy color yeah I
01:01:01
thought that was like ruy and goes on to say that the suspect was wearing blue denim jeans a gray
01:01:08
hooded sweatshirt and Teardrop sunglasses smoked with smoked lenses not a lot to go off of there no obviously
01:01:17
this person thought that there was a chance that they would be seen placing this bomb in that parking lot and even
01:01:24
though it's behind the business they were organized enough in their attack that they chose to disguise themsel or
01:01:31
at the very least conceal their appearance in some manner with the sunglasses and the hooded sweatshirt but
01:01:37
now that we got the composite sketch they're going to be coming out and they they're going to tell you they're all
01:01:42
connected and all by the way this is a guy that we believe is the uni bomber right so we have noticed the two major
01:01:50
shifts in this case and investigation one the attacks have now become lethal the bomb maker has retooled and
01:01:58
constructed a better explosive device and two now we have something on this guy we have a witness description so
01:02:07
where before we simply just had the FC markings that's the bombers including with the bombs now we at least have some
01:02:14
idea of what this guy looks like thanks for joining us here in the garage my gift to you on my birthday is a promo
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