Flash light bomber

[CommissarRezail]

http://gma.yahoo.com/blogs/abc-blogs...opstories.html

This is almost like from a movie, but a guy is running around placing flash light bombs( bombs inside the flash light) and blowing up and injuring people.
Its quiet evidently he doing with some sort of evil intent, considering the bombs blow up when you turn on the flash light. He making a well thought out decision to fuck people over with a joke on the side " Turn on the flash light to see the light" the explosion that is. So anyone near that area be careful. This man is sick and insane and waste his skills on just pure insanty. If you got skills like that then why build flash light bombs to hurt innocent people.

[Langy]

Luckily, the bombs are pretty minor as far as they go - all the injuries so far have been minor, from what I remember.

[Akranadas]

I'm calling it now; Terrorism Charges.

[Langy]

Well, yeah. If that shit doesn't count as terrorism in the courts, then we've got to change those laws.

[CommissarRezail]

No kidding, what he doing could lead to big death tolls, if he just gets slap on the wrist it be a insult to America.

[SquidDNA]

Er, I don't know, I think you need some ideological motivation (read: desired external outcome of a state of terror) to be distinguish a terrorist from a serial bomber. If the perpetrator is essentially doing this for fun, he's just a criminal, and you're labeling him as a terrorist as an emotional reaction to the effects of his crime. If a white man shoots and kills a black man, you can't call it a hate crime just because the perpetrator happened to be a real bastard and the victim was a nice, popular college student, and it makes you angry that one killed the other-- you have to demonstrate that the crime was racially motivated. If he just wanted the guy's wallet, he just wanted the guy's wallet.

Now, Krandy may well be right-- this could be ideologically motivated. But a string of crimes doesn't equal terrorism.

[Langy]

I suppose you're right - federal law defines terrorism as violence that's politically motivated. Could be that he's just an idiot.

[Carl]

Seriouslly i'd say everyone's lucky there have been no deaths. if the guy was competent with explosives this could have been REALLY nasty, those flashlights look big enough to contain a decent sized pipe bomb, (or similar). Given the randomness of the attacks and the fact that no ones come forward to claim responsability i'd be suprised if this is politiclly motivated. It seems to be out just to cause as much terror and fear as possibble.

[Paladin]

Could be worse... He could have been the fleshlight bomber...

[Langy]

That is just so wrong on so many levels, Paladin.

Number one possibly being 'who the hell would use a fleshlight they just found on the street?'

[CommissarRezail]

Could be worse... He could have been the fleshlight bomber...

That could be possible if he get his hands on white phosphorus(the one that light things on fire instantly), which could be insanely effective to lighting people on fire. It would be horrific...

[Kalimac]

Paladin: Why was I thinking the exact same thing.
I blame the internet.

[Malachi]

Oh nooo, I thought I forgot about that!

On a more serious note, do you guys think it's fair that we have laws that determine the punishment depending on the criminal's intentions? Why is it worse to do something because of your ideology or religious fanaticism than to do the same thing just because you're mean and/or stupid? Doesn't this leave a whole lot room for manipulation?

[SquidDNA]

Manipulation by whom?

[Malachi]

What does it matter? There's a better possibility of manipulation than if it wasn't like that.

[SquidDNA]

You're not making a very good argument if you cannot provide an example to illustrate.

[Starblade]

On a more serious note, do you guys think it's fair that we have laws that determine the punishment depending on the criminal's intentions?

Do you not agree there's a difference between involuntary manslaughter and premeditated murder?

If that shit doesn't count as terrorism in the courts, then we've got to change those laws.

"Terrorism" is already a vague and near-meaningless word as it is, it seems to me like that would just make it worse.

[Carl]

@Starblade: i think malachi's point is weather he's doing this becuase he's a nut, or becuase he's a general nut or a politicol nut is kind of irellevent. Wether he's out to kill people or not is obviouslly a valid question. But he does raise a good point. Is weather somthing is motivated by politica or religious leanings really "that" important.

[Malachi]

@Squid: Whatever, I thought what I said was simple enough not to require an example.

Let's say that an influential black man gets assaulted and robbed by a white gangster, then bribes the judge/court to convict the accued of a hate crime.

@Starblade: I agree there's a difference, just not necessarily that it's good to have different legal penalties for them.

Also, stop answering questions with questions, that's bad practice.

[SquidDNA]

The exploit in the system in your example is obviously bribery, not the legal distinction of hate crimes from conventional assaults.

[Malachi]

So? Bribery wouldn't work if not for that legal distinction. Hence, legal dostinction leaves more room for bribery.

[Carl]

@malachi: whilst I get that point I think your way off base here. The fact that the system is open to abuses such as bribery, (due to the nature of the human condition and all that jazz), is the problem there. Not the fact that there is a legal distinction.

I think a much more valid thought here is:

Why does it matter why someone is setting off bombs and trying to kill/maim/terrify people. Both are equally dangerous and equally in the wrong.

That to me is why murder/manslaughter/pre-meditated deserve separate definition. Someone who commits manslaughter is ultimately guilty of nothing more than a very serious form of negligence. They're likely to be very remorseful about what they've done, and special circumstances aside are unlikely to repeat the error. They're simply not a threat to society at large in the future and so locking them up is about punishment, not the safety of the general population. Someone who commits murder however may very well be much more dangerous, particularly if they're unremorseful. Whilst pre-meditated, (Especially if it is multiple murders, and more so if over a period of time), represents and even greater level of threat. At that upper extreme prison becomes far more about protecting the general public from the danger of this individual on the loose than it does about punishing the individual responsible.

At the end of it to me the whole thing looks like nothing more than an attempt to add extra deterrents to politically motivated bombings. To push people away from certain actions more strongly than others, even though both represent the same level of harm and future threat to the populace. It's a (probably non-intentional), form of social engineering than a genuine attempt to match the legal aspect to the severity of the crime and the potential future danger upon the convicted individuals release.

[Paladin]

Malachi: In the case of a hate crime, or terrorism, the prosecution (Not the court, we don't have a British style system where the court prosecutes you) must prove Mens Rea to make it stick. Which is very difficult unless the subject actually confessed to it or was keeping a diary or wrote a manifesto or something talking about his intentions or his hatred for a certain group. Bribing a judge would be useless, you'd have to bribe an entire jury, since they're the ones who make the determination of guilt or innocence, and that's both difficult and dangerous, since you have 7-12 people to bribe (Depending on whether this is a majority vote or unanimous decision trial), any one of whom may turn out to be principled enough to report you instead of taking the money.

Even if you managed to accomplish this goal, and secure a conviction, it would simply be overturned on appeal if you didn't have enough evidence of Mens Rea anyway. And this could lead to the person being set free with all charges dismissed entirely, so really, do you even want to go to that kind of trouble just to end up with your efforts getting the man off scot free?

Securing a hate crime or terrorism type conviction is very difficult unless the guy in question is a moron or a zealot who's left enough evidence laying around to hang himself with.

Now, if we're talking a destitute bastard with no resources, who has to use a public defender, it's entirely possible he'd be railroaded into a hate crime conviction, but that's not a problem with the hate crime legislation itself, it's a serious flaw in our system period, that anyone who is not fairly wealthy has almost zero chance of defending themselves from criminal charges even if the state's case is horribly weak, and any competent lawyer could get them off. Hell, I've seen people sent up on charges so weak that a first year law student could have gotten them off the hook, but they couldn't afford to hire an attorney, so they got a public defender who could only give their case the tiniest little bit of time and effort due to his massive caseload.

But again, that's nothing to do with hate crimes specifically, which are quite hard to convict someone of if he actually has competent representation.

[Jak.]

Where do you get explosives these days anyway? Proper explosives, not repurposed fireworks or gunpowder. Sure, you might be able to repurpose common chemicals, but they won't be too properly explosive. The main one thats nice and easy, anfo, is all but removed for non-farm use, and farm use is probably regulated to hell. Also, triggering when the torch is switched on is the easiest way of checking that you actually have someone there.

[TDATL]

@Jak: Fireworks and gunpowder are "proper" explosives. Not to mention you can make some seriously powerful explosives with incredibly common chemicals.

Over the counter medicine, gardening supplies, and cleaning supplies all provide more than enough combinations and sources for people who know enough and crazy enough to make homemade bombs.

[Paladin]

Yeah, the majority of people don't have a clue how, but it's not really difficult to turn stuff you probably have in your house into explosives.

[Carl]

The IRA had a cute trick for filling their pipe bombs too. No chemichials or production on their part involved if they didn't want and avalibile comerciolly off the shelf even in the UK. I'm not going to go into speifics for obvious reasons. But suffice to say it was potent enough for them.

[SquidDNA]

I appreciate the discretion people have exercised already but I would like to reinforce that this is absolutely not going to continue as a discussion about how to make explosives. Thanks!