Boston bombing: Man got crackers from same store as Times Square bomber
Source: PTI
24 Apr, 2013, 03.33PM IST
BOSTON: The slain Chechan-origin Boston bombings suspect bought "barely legal" lethal explosives from the same fireworks store that sold crackers to Times Square Pakistani-origin terrorist for the failed 2010 car bomb plot.
Boston Marathon bomber Tamerlan Tsarnaev walked into a New Hampshire fireworks store two months before his deadly attack and asked for the "biggest and loudest" kit in the store -- then got another set free.
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In a chilling twist, the company that sold Tamerlan the fireworks is the same company that sold Times Square bomber Faisal Shahzad the firecrackers he used to build his failed car bomb, the New York Daily News reported.
"We were just shocked," said Bill Weimer, vice president of Phamtom Fireworks in Seabrook, New Hampshire.
"After our Times Square experience, we said, 'It can't happen twice'". But it did.
Read more: http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/news-by-industry/et-cetera/boston-bombing-man-got-crackers-from-same-store-as-times-square-bomber/articleshow/19709799.cms
TheCowsCameHome
(40,161 posts)hillrunner1960
(1 post)Many fireworks stores do "buy one/get one free" deals, so I'm not sure why this is even being discussed. The fireworks stores in NH are very limited in what they can sell, due to strict regulations. As an example, rocket-type fireworks have been banned for years. Down south the regulations are looser and more elaborate fireworks are available to the general public.
Bottom line is this - the bomber bought some fireworks legally in NH. That doesn't make Phantom Fireworks, the employees, or the owners part of the problem. This terrorist would have gotten what he needed one way or the other. It was a coincidence that the NY bomber got stuff from the same company.
Sheesh, the media will publish anything just for a sound bite or headline...
hrmjustin
(71,265 posts)uppityperson
(115,674 posts)Welcome to DU
Trajan
(19,089 posts)You are not sure why this is even being discussed ? .... Over 170 people injured and maimed ... 3 wonderful human beings dead ... Nearly 20 maimings ... countless millions in future medical care ....
It is being discussed because somebody went to THAT store, made THAT transaction, and did THAT with the proceeds of that transaction ....
That is why it is being discussed ....
The fact that the NY Bomber went to the same store indicates that lessons were not learned from the Times Square event ... It is indicative in itself that nothing happened to change the calculus ... and that is a story unto itself ....
It matters not which store they went to .. true .... BUT; they did go to that store, and they did get that deal .... if these transactions could have happened at any store, then THIS store simply represents those other stores, and so is the representative sample of the problem that exists in many places ....
Whatever regulations or rules that are written for this case, with Phantom Fireworks, should happen across the board, with the industry as a whole ...
Your nonchalance in dismissing these facts is problematic, revealing that segments of society don't understand the issues, and wrongly place some misbegotten sense of community pride over the rights of all citizens to enjoy their lives without getting blown up ....
Iggo
(47,486 posts)For a second I thought, "Why the hell do I care where this guy buys his Ritz?"
charlie and algernon
(13,447 posts)I'm thinking "shit, I've been to enought 7-11's and RiteAids in my life that I've probably bought snacks in the same store as criminals too."
Sheldon Cooper
(3,724 posts)I was thinking this was from the Onion or something.
treestar
(82,383 posts)Marrah_G
(28,581 posts)Demoiselle
(6,787 posts)I was wondering how they can trace Saltines.
SacoMaine61
(114 posts)awoke_in_2003
(34,582 posts)snooper2
(30,151 posts)best place in the country!
charlie and algernon
(13,447 posts)A-MAZ-ING!
Blandocyte
(1,231 posts)tonekat
(1,805 posts)I'm guessing Red Bull.
truthisfreedom
(23,113 posts)I love sparklers and anything that shoots up in the air, but I have no use whatsoever for firecrackers. They can be disappeared for all I care. Make them completely illegal and save a few childhood fingers.
olddad56
(5,732 posts)DallasNE
(7,392 posts)Creates markets and markets don't self-regulate. They didn't here and they didn't in West, TX either so of course it happened twice. And it will happen again without stiffer regulation. You can take that to the bank.
Xithras
(16,191 posts)Background checks to buy Whistling Pete's and Fire Flowers?
You can make an incredibly effective fuel-air bomb using nothing more than a few gallons of gasoline, some ground match heads, and an ignitor. You can build a napth bomb with ground mothballs capable of taking out a crowd.
There is no possible way to regulate all of the materials that could theoretically be used in bomb making. Our world is full of stuff that can go boom, and it only takes a few minutes on the Internet to figure out how to do it.
DallasNE
(7,392 posts)You don't do background checks on BB guns so you don't do background checks on certain classes of fireworks. It is always a matter of finding where to draw the line in the sand but background checks are in order for bigger items, etc. Adding taggants (sp) would help as well, if only the NRA wouldn't stand in the way of common sense solutions. Nobody thinks everything can be shut down but that is no excuse for doing nothing.
Xithras
(16,191 posts)Taggants help investigators to trace the source of the purchases. This article makes it clear that they were able to trace the materials just fine anyway.
FWIW, the lack of taggants nowadays has little to do with the NRA. Congress dropped the issue after the National Science Foundation conducted a nonpartisan analysis of the technology and found that it offered little to no real benefit in crime fighting, and would have imposed significant expense that would have caused food costs to increase at the grocery store (the most common sources of explosive material are agriculturally based). Even the FBI couldn't identify a single case that would have been solved if taggants were in place.
Sometimes, yes you do simply have to throw your hands up. The world is full of crazy people, and sometimes they will kill other people. There is no way to prevent that from happening without creating a police state. The cure would be worse than the disease.