Florida attorney pleads guilty to trying to detonate explosives near Chinese embassy in Washington

Stamau123@lemmy.world to News@lemmy.world – 257 points –
Florida attorney pleads guilty to trying to detonate explosives near Chinese embassy in Washington
apnews.com

A Florida attorney pleaded guilty on Friday to using a rifle to try to detonate explosives outside the Chinese embassy last year in Washington, D.C.

Christopher Rodriguez also bombed a sculpture of communist leaders Vladimir Lenin and Mao Zedong in a courtyard outside the Texas Public Radio building in San Antonio, Texas, in 2022, according to a court filing accompanying his guilty plea.

Rodriguez, 45, of Panama City, Florida, is scheduled to be sentenced in Washington by Chief Judge James Boasberg on Oct. 28.

Under the terms of his plea deal, Rodriguez and prosecutors agreed that seven to 10 years in prison would be an appropriate sentence.

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This guy sounds like a shitstain that needs to go away for a long time.

Now let’s talk about this:

Christopher Rodriguez also bombed a sculpture of communist leaders Vladimir Lenin and Mao Zedong in a courtyard outside the Texas Public Radio building in San Antonio, Texas, in 2022,

WTF? Why is there a statue of these monsters outside of a public radio station?

Edit: See excellent comments below. The statue mocked them! Why was he blowing it up? Is he a communist?

Edit: Please read the excellent comments. There is a good reason. They are being mocked by the sculptor.

The bigger WTF is that he used explosives on a public building 2 years ago and is both still free and an attorney in 2024 who attempted another bombing.

In Canada under the criminal code, using a bomb and/or causing and explosion with the intent of doing body harm or property damage is a very serious offense that'll get you at least 10 years.

The Seattle Times hired someone who then wrote a rant about how horrible it is that there’s a statue of Lenin in Seattle…on private land.. There was an uproar and he was quickly fired. You made the same argument.

I guess if you’re gonna blow something up, a statue of a guy who killed more people than hitler is … not so objectionable a thing…

Granted, there’s better ways to get rid of a statue.

This reminds me that they never caught the Jan 6 bomber that planted explosives at the DNC and RNC headquarters.

And that was just nuts. Like the bomb failed to go off so they had a lot to work with. But they got nothing? Nothing at all? It would be odd that the bomber was intelligent enough to not leave behind any evidence leading back to them but also not have the bomb be built good enough to actually blow.

My guess is that the phone network was so jammed up that the signal couldn't come through. It may have been made perfectly well, but apparently on that day, especially when things started going down, the cell network was totally overwhelmed and nothing could go through it. I think I remember watching a reporter when the rioting first started happening discuss that their phone wasn't working, and also people were trying to stream Trump's speech and it couldn't come through.

From the description of the bomb, it was not a phone call triggered. It was a very simple time bomb made using a mechanical kitchen timer. Kitchen timers are available anywhere, making tracing a purchase or former owner very difficult (especially if the bomber salvaged a perfectly functional timer from the trash, that would render it untraceable to the bomber). But cell-phones? Not so much, if they found an intact cell-phone, even one that the bomber bought in cash from some small store, they would have had a much easier time tracking who they were.

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Wow, I guess the Florida Bar's Character and Fitness requirements are exactly what you'd expect out of that place.

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