Accused pipe bombers make court appearance
By Jim Phillips
July 24, 2008
In an initial court appearance Friday, three young men from Nelsonville charged with setting off homemade pipe bombs did all but admit to being involved in the offense.
Though told by acting Athens County Municipal Judge Thomas Cornn that they had the right to remain silent, the three defendants – Logan W. Clay, 19, Roy E. Plant III, 18, and Bryson D. Cuthill, 18, all made comments during their court appearance indicating that they had been involved with setting off the bombs.
They denied some of the details of authorities’ allegations, however. None was represented by an attorney.
The men have been charged with arson and three counts apiece of possessing dangerous ordnance, both felonies.
They are accused of setting off explosive devices in multiple locations, including a pipe bomb at a camera shop in uptown Nelsonville Thursday morning that blew out a window and caused over $1,000 worth of damage.
On the same morning, authorities allege, the three had earlier planted explosive devices near the Nelsonville-York junior high school on Kimberly Road, and on the roof the Nelsonville Elks’ Lodge.
In their court appearance, when Cornn asked each of the men if they wanted to say anything about a proposed bond, Cuthill at first said nothing.
When the question was put to Clay, however, he told the judge that he “only hung out with (the other two) on the last night.” (Authorities are claiming that the trio may also have been behind an explosion about a week earlier, behind the Eagles’ Lodge in Nelsonville.)
The other two then made comments as well, denying that they had made, as alleged, up to five different devices, and claiming that they had made only three.
“They weren’t intended to be explosive devices, they were meant to be ‘cannon’-type ,” Plant added.
Athens County assistant prosecutor Keller Blackburn said the three defendants “started their massive destruction” on Wednesday night of last week, after they went in to the Speedway store in Nelsonville to buy a cigarette lighter.
Upon buying the lighter, Blackburn alleged, one of the men “told the clerks they were going to hear a loud boom soon” – which authorities know, he said, because the comment was captured on a store video camera.
He said the trio first blew up a mailbox at the junior high, then moved on to the Elks’ hall. Finally, he alleged, they committed “the most heinous of all” their offenses, when they taped a pipe bomb to the front window of the Wilson Pro Photo Shop on West Washington Street, near the Nelsonville town square.
The resultant explosion kept the road closed off for many hours, and did more than $1,000 of damage to Wilson’s, Blackburn said. Making the crime even worse, he said, is that when questioned, the defendants admitted that they had in past incidents fired paintballs at the business as well.
Their stated motive for targeting Wilson’s, according to Blackburn, was “because the owner of the business was weird.” He suggested this might refer to the fact that the owner has suffered a stroke which affects his behavior.
Blackburn said the pipe bomb used was a PVC pipe sealed at both ends, packed with gunpowder and shrapnel such as nails and tacks, which could have caused injury or death to anyone who had been walking by when it went off.
“The only reason we don’t have some physical harm here is because we were lucky,” he declared.
Cornn set bond for each of the three at $150,000, with no 10 percent allowed.
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