Mom Arrested After Son Makes Dry Ice "Bombs"

formfeed writes "Police were called to a house in Omaha where a 14-year-old made some 'dry ice bombs' (dry ice in soda bottles). Since his mom knew about it, she is now facing felony charges for child endangment and possession of a destructive device. From the article: 'Assistant Douglas County Attorney Eric Wells said the boy admitted to making the bomb and that his mother knew he was doing so. The boy was set to appear Tuesday afternoon in juvenile court, accused of possessing a destructive device.'" She's lucky they didn't find the baking soda volcano in the basement.

Comments

Sounds familiar.

[Leebert]

This lets me tell one of my favorite stories (which probably isn't all that funny.)

I have a friend who is a physicist. He was hanging around with his brother, who worked at a bookstore. They were doing essentially the same thing, but with liquid nitrogen, behind the store. After one particularly loud bottle explosion, they went back into the store, only to hear a loud pounding on the door shortly thereafter.

Opening the door, they were faced with a Baltimore County police officer, who demanded an explanation. My friend started to explain: "Oh, it's OK Officer, I'm a physicist..." As if that explained everything. Which, to be honest, probably does.

I make that joke more often than you could imagine at the physicists at work.

But in all seriousness, this continues what I've been calling the "war on curiosity". Recently, I accidentally picked a flight that had a stopover (that's what I get for clicking through the website too fast.) So while I was bored and waiting on the plane, I wandered up next to the front row of seats and peered into the cockpit. I was there for a minute or so, until the flight attendant came up in a fairly huffy attitude, and told me that I couldn't congregate in the front of the plane. Which was on the ground. With the engine shut off. With the wheels chocked. And the pilot sitting in his seat.

I'm afraid anymore to walk to the end of the platform and look down the subway tunnels. I'm afraid to take pictures of bridges. I'm afraid to be just plain curious, because it's apparently abnormal and suspicous. It's getting ridiculous. And it's going to come back and bite us in the butt.

Re:Sounds familiar.

[Wonko the Sane]

I'm afraid anymore to walk to the end of the platform and look down the subway tunnels. I'm afraid to take pictures of bridges. I'm afraid to be just plain curious, because it's apparently abnormal and suspicous. It's getting ridiculous. And it's going to come back and bite us in the butt.

You say this as if it is an unintended, rather than intended, consequence of how our society is organized.

Re:Sounds familiar.

[Skater]

I'm afraid anymore to walk to the end of the platform and look down the subway tunnels. I'm afraid to take pictures of bridges. I'm afraid to be just plain curious, because it's apparently abnormal and suspicous. It's getting ridiculous. And it's going to come back and bite us in the butt.

As a railfan, I hesitate to take pictures of trains outside museums for similar reasons. Plenty have been accosted or detained for doing nothing more than taking pictures of trains from passenger platforms and similar places, and Amtrak put out a policy recently that makes little sense. Last summer I took a picture of a train that I'd just ridden for two hours (not Amtrak), and I actually felt nervous about it for a moment afterward. I've taken some pictures inside DC's Metro stations from time to time without a problem, but the thought of having the police show up crosses my mind every time I do it.

Of course the solution is to take more pictures of trains so that feeling goes away. But that just increases the odds I'll get some attention from the police over it.

Re:Sounds familiar.

[Nadaka]

The war against American intellect is not affected by any outside foreign power as far as I can tell, unless of course you count the Vatican and they are at best a minor player. No, it waged internally be people who's power base relies on people not asking questions and just doing as they are told. It is domestic conservative and religious organizations that are poisoning the American spirit and sapping the will to learn from the people.

Re:Sounds familiar.

[I'm not really here]

Seriously, this type of slapdown on curiosity, creativity, and exploration makes me want to cry. It reminds me of the fall of the galactic empire in Asimov's Foundation series - a degredation of the desire to learn new things... People don't want children to dream and invent, they want them to memorize, regurgitate, and keep the status quo.
 
An example of the insanity: I love model rocketry. I can build small rockets with no one looking at me sideways (but when I move up to the C or D engines, and buy in large quantity, I start to get odd looks), but I don't want to build small rockets. I want to build large rockets, with radio controlled fins, a wireless video feed, and much stronger engines (either solid state or even move into simple liquid fuels). Now if I were interested in this say 50 years back, this would be odd, but not unheard of, and certainly not slapped down by local law enforcement. In today's age, if I started messing with liquid fuels, or built rockets over 6 feet tall, I would likely get harassed by local law enforcement (or more likely my neighbors would call for them), assuming I could even get the proper permits to be allowed to build the thing... permits to build something with my own two hands and then test it out on my friend's private property (a farm)? CRAZY, and wrong.
 
I hope we get out of this funk and get some new chemistry and engineering excitement back into our children. Sigh.

Re:Sounds familiar.

[Svartalf]

And if you believe it is solely that, you'd be mistaken. The domestic liberal organizations have as much to blame on that front as the others.

Re:Sounds familiar.

[JWW]

This isn't just a one sided political happening. While I will agree that some conservative thought demands that people "don't ask questions," we also face liberal thought that severely punishes "asking the wrong questions."

Re:Sounds familiar.

[Bayoudegradeable]

A buddy of mine and I were doing the same dry ice thing a few years back. Just good old curiosity. What the heck is gonna happen if we drop dry ice, water and seal up the two liter? Honestly, it's a MUCH bigger bang than I would have thought. The top and fragments were sent all over the driveway. So after the third ones the neighbors called, and we realized it was time to stop : ) I do remember thinking that something like this, packed with the wrong stuff inside could cause some trouble. I guess, in a strict sense, it is a bomb after all. Side note... taking pictures of oil refineries, oil pipelines in south Louisiana (pre-spill, mind you, post 9/11) will get you harassed quickly by local law enforcement. I remember telling one officer, "You know, this used to be a free country." Instead of getting irate he began the "hey look, just doing my job" routine. He then went on to talk about all the press restrictions and lock-down procedures they have if an accident or attack were ever to happen at an oil processing facility. It's sad how much money, effort and energy is wasted on keeping us "safe" from terror.... I mean think about it; what did OBL and company spend in bringing down the twin towers? What have we spent since? What have we "gained" in the war of terror? In terms of dollars to outcome; we have lost. Terribly.

Re:Sounds familiar.

[adonoman]

wierd times

WTF? It's weird only in that everyone is freaked out all the time. The risk of anything is way lower these days - there's a reason our life expectancy is cracking 80, and it's not just medical advances. It's not like crazies are a new thing - people have been trying to blow things up since gunpowder was invented. They just didn't have 24-hour news to whip us all up into a panic. Things you really should be worried about - driving accidents, falling, accidental poisoning, work related injuries, getting hit by a car, drowning, seasonal flu, fatal hernia, accidental gunshot, electrocution, law enforcement shooting you. All of which are more common preventable causes of death in the last 20 years than dying from a terrorist explosion (including the 9/11 deaths).

Re:Sounds familiar.

[Hylandr]

I agree.

The levels of paranoia are getting truly absurd. There was Terrorism in the 70's, the 80's, and the 90's but here comes the new millennia and everyone just turns their brains off and those that don't get punished for it.

- Dan.

Re:Sounds familiar.

[digitig]

Well if it is a war on curiosity, pick your side, mate. Resist ! Once they'll discover that 99% of the people caught by anti-terrorist laws were genuinely curious persons, they may think about stopping the madness.

Assuming, of course, that it matters to them who they catch, and they're not simply interested in keeping the fear levels high.

Re:Sounds familiar.

[Altus]

competitive with who exactly? Anyone who thinks this problem is limited to America is fooling themselves.

Re:Sounds familiar.

[Skater]

If I'm on a list for occasionally taking pics of trains, then I'm on plenty of other lists, too... Oh well. It's not the lists that bothers me. It's the risk of getting arrested or something.

Like someone else said most likely it wouldn't get that far - I'm a reasonable person. My point was more about the culture that has been created.

Re:Sounds familiar.

[clone53421]

Not if Dewey was being sarcastic in the first quote. You assume that Dewey approved of the “collective society” he predicted in which free thinking was a liability.

Re:Sounds familiar.

[kc8apf]

People who will try to cause fear and injury aren't new. There hasn't been any proof that all this legislation and fear mongering around curiosity has actually made us any safer. We live in an inherently dangerous world. It's time to realize that we can't baby-proof it. Then we can get back to doing research, having odd hobbies, and being generally curious without fear of being accosted.

Re:Sounds familiar.

[JTsyo]

That's not crazy at all. What would be the range of a 6ft rocket? What kind of damage can it do with fuel still in it?

Re:Sounds familiar.

[bdenton42]

Even Mythbusters is censoring themselves. They were mixing up some kind of explosive the other day and Adam said "We're going to make *bleep* by mixing *bleep* with *bleep*". It's sad really.

Re:Sounds familiar.

[IndustrialComplex]

It is domestic conservative and religious organizations that are poisoning the American spirit and sapping the will to learn from the people.

It is neither, and all. It is people who just want what is best for you.

It is people who feel that you must behave in the manner that most benefits you (and more importantly society). It is people that believe that it is ok to tell you what to do, as long as they are doing it with a positive intent.

It is people who are too afraid to let anyone fail.

And it is working because it's a hell of a lot easier to win support when you are doing 'good' than it is when you are the person who advocates for personal freedom.

For a good example of this, look at the lack of a response when one of our future Supreme Court justices didn't have a problem when asked, "Could I write a law that tells you what you have to eat?"

Such a question should have been laughed out of the room, not because it was a silly question (and a gotcha with regard to a future question on Health Care), but because such a thing as the government being authorized to mandate to such a personal level as to what you must eat is laughably authoritarian.

But, terrifingly, such a concept didn't even make it out of the internet muckraking circles. And that's why we have this problem, because people think the ends justify the means.

Re:Sounds familiar.

[Xcruciate]

I don't care what anybody says, the terrorists from 9/11 have accomplished what they set out to do. They have turned our country and most of the world into paranoid land. That is a worse fate than the deaths of 3,000 + people. We are afraid of our own countrymen now.

Re:Sounds familiar.

[potat0man]

Normally I agree with the advice of, "Just do what your told, forget it, move along, keep your head down, it's not worth it."

Normally that's good advice if you're busy, the issue is particularly petty or you're particularly vulnerable in some way like you're on probation or you're far from home. The problem is that if everybody follows the advice, and nobody is willing to take the risk of standing up for himself, or someone else. And nobody ever sticks his neck out, then your abuse will multiply rather than simply go away.

Yeah, you might be far from home, just waiting for a train to get you out of there. In that case, shutting up and being cowardly may be advisable. But if you're not, if you're home and there are people you know who can post bail, and showing up to court a half-dozen times won't involve an inter-state trip, I'd say it's time to stand up for yourself. Nobody else will. Too many people are heeding the advice to, "shutup and move along, let someone with a spine correct police abuse, you don't want to deal with that!"

People can only abuse you to the extent you allow them to.

And when you see someone get himself arrested over something you think is silly. Instead of calling him a fool and telling him not to forget the KY, you should applaud him for standing up for his rights because ultimately he's also standing up for yours.

Re:Sounds familiar.

[Mal-2]

This is because not telling you how to do it is simpler, faster, and incurs less liability than having to explain how to do it RIGHT. There's more to making explosives than just the chemicals that go into them.

They know full well that if you really want to do it yourself, the information is out there. They just don't want the remaining fingers pointed at THEM when it blows up in someone's hand.

Mal-2

Re:Sounds familiar.

[Mister Whirly]

If I am going down for a computer related crime, I want to be the one responsible for committing it. Sorry, but I am not setting up an open unsecured network that I am ultimately responsible for. Seeing I don't have carrier status, I am not immune from being prosecuted for whatever child porn my neighbor wants to peruse on my connection. And having an unsecured Wi-Fi router has been proven to not stand up as a defense in such cases. Not only that, no matter how much information "wants to be free", I still seem to have to pay for my internet connection and don't see why others should not have to do the same.

Re:Sounds familiar.

[I'm not really here]

Thank you for the information. I wasn't saying that it was illegal, I was simply pointing out that 50 years ago, the attitude was "play, learn, build, and play some more until you get to college and learn to build even bigger toys." This excited kids (don't you remember those home chemistry kits? Now we've got someone getting arrested for playing with dried ice and a plastic bottle!?!).
 
Today's attitude is "if it could be slightly dangerous, it shouldn't be allowed, and if a minor is doing it, punish the parent."
 
We need to foster more creativity, exploration, and (yes) dangerous activities into our children's lives, not less, otherwise our society will stagnate, and we'll fall into ruin.

Re:Sounds familiar.

[ktappe]

And if the cops ask you to delete photos, play along, because recovering the deleted photographs is trivial compared to what can happen when arguing with a cop.

Great practical advice. However, it's horrible civil disobedience advice. By complying with the officer's illegal demand, you're empowering him to make the same demand of other photographers who might not be as technically adept and who really will lose their photos. A bully appeased is a bully emboldened.

Re:Sounds familiar.

[Anonymous Coward]

As someone who was arrested (turned myself in) and prosecuted for trying draino "bombs" in a safe area, with no people present, in the middle of the night... I know you can't mess around with these stupid little things anymore. One of them didn't pop, and no kidding, a bomb squad was called in. This was years before 9/11.

Slingshots, pop bottle "bombs", firecrackers, pocket knives, laser pointers, video or still cameras, potato guns, chemistry sets, any other rudimentary projectile devices or things that go "pop" are all more trouble than they're worth anymore.

Kids need to stay inside, play e-rated video games and eat hot pockets from here-on-out if they want to avoid serious run-in's with the authorities.

Re:Sounds familiar.

[Xonstantine]

Yeah, the SCOTUS that appointed a president was SUCH a model of government restraint.

That's how the Democratic narrative goes, but the reality was a *bit* different. The Florida Supreme Court kept trying to redefine election law and using variable standards until they found a result that would result in the election of Al Gore. Ironically, the only one that would have resulted in an actual Gore victory (re-count of all Florida votes instead of just targeting Broward county) is the one that Gore and the Florida Supreme Court were afraid to try. Team Gore wasn't exactly being a champion of democracy in this affair.

And in actual regards to the conservative members of the Supreme Court, they have a much better track record siding with the individual than the government as compared to the "liberal" members of the court, everything from Kelo vs Connecticut to Heller vs DC and McDonald vs Chicago. About the only thing the minority members can agree the government can't do is outlaw abortion.

Re:Sounds familiar.

[Rene S. Hollan]

All good in theory. However, all it takes to arrest you is "probable cause", and to hold you is a judge upholding a finding of "probable cause".

You will likely be arrested, for being difficult, argumentative, and most importantly, acting suspiciously around a sensitive area.

Either you have an attorney, which will cost you significant $$$, or you will be assigned a public defender, who will, in 95% of the cases stipulate (that is, agree), to probable cause. Bail will be set (very high, if your address can not be immediately verified, and this can take a few days), or not (if you are a suspected terrorist), and if you can not pay, you will be stuck in jail. If you can, you can expect to be called before the court and formally charged and asked to enter a plea within two weeks. More $$$ spent on a lawyer.

Now, if the case is really weak, the district attorney might decide to drop it, but they are generally evaluated and rewarded for being "tough on crime", especially terrorism, so expect the I-dotting and T-crossing of formal charges and a criminal trial. If the DA thinks the case is weak, you might be offered a plea bargain for something like "disorderly conduct", placed on probation, and fined a few hundred or thousand dollars. The third option, is that charges will not be formally pressed, but can be pending until the statute of limitations runs out. 97% of criminal cases never go to trial: many are plea-bargained out.

So, you decide to stand for your principles and face trial. Good for you! This will cost you plenty. Simply being arrested might have gotten you fired, particularly in an "at-will" employment state.

The chances are pretty good that your defense will stand up. But, expect it to be very expensive. Justice does not come cheap, unfortunately.

And, yes, this can have a very chilling effect on lawful public actions. In fact, people who fight for civil rights are USED to being impoverished, unemployed, and spending significant lengths of time in jail.

How do I know? I went down this road after being arrested (and never formally charged) with felony child abuse for preventing my young son from not running into the middle of a busy highway. See, in his struggle, he managed to get a clothing abrasion mark on himself. I chose to plead guilty to disorderly conduct to FORCE (well, encourage: no DA can turn down the chance for another conviction in their notch) the DA to drop the charges rather than wait out the statute of limitations (and technically, I WAS guilty of disorderly conduct: acting in a manner (possibly trying to kidnap a child) that might incite someone to assault me (to "save" said child). Ironically, protecting him from himself would be an affirmative defense against assault, but would not be against DC.).

Further, I reasoned that (a) charges could be laid any time within the statute of limitations, (b) my daughter had desired to leave her mother and live with me and pending felony assault charges would do me no good in that case, and (c) spending the money on a legal defense would arguably not be in the best interest of my children and therefore be used as evidence to charge me with neglect and abuse. The laws being what they are, if you have kids, the state owns you (and that's a subject for another rant).

Now, if I was responsible for no one but myself, then Hell, f***ing yeah! Bring it on, a**holes!, and spend a lot of money and risk 10 to 20 in jail. I would think, however, that maybe one in a hundred are in a position where they are not responsible for the welfare of others, and of those, one in a thousand would risk incarceration to fight for their principles. Those of us who have responsibilities, or are otherwise cowardly in this regard, should therefore, vocally and peacefully support those who DO stand up for principle.

Re:Sounds familiar.

[geekgirlandrea]

They may be trying to protect their freedoms with regard to certain politically touchy subjects, like for example whether a 16 year old can get an abortion or contraceptives without parents hearing about it.

Funny how those people's idea of 'protecting their freedom' invariably involves restricting someone else's.

Pfft, I can top that.

[Becausegodhasmademe]

I reckon about 90% of all Slashdotters made/did way more dangerous things when they were younger. I certainly did and I look forward to doing them with my kids too! It's like a ritual part of childhood in my family!

Re:Pfft, I can top that.

[singingjim1]

potato and tennis ball guns made from tennis ball cans (they used to be metal) and duct tape, and using lighter fluid to launch projectiles and friggin long way. We were 12!

Home Chemistry has been dead for a long time...

[Anonymous Coward]

Of course, this is actually part of my hometown's attempt to make it completely undesirable to live here.

I've heard that next week they will start cracking down on rubber band "guns", too...

Education is dangerous

[grimsnaggle]

Society needs to figure out that it can't have it both ways. You can't desire educated kids without giving them the freedom to explore, particularly so long as the damage they do is limited to their own lives and property. Alpha double plusses require a large bottle, right?

Be thankful

[Hognoxious]

Be thankful they weren't taking photographs too, or they'd be looking at 25 in PMITA.

Watch out!

[rotide]

If over pressurizing a container until it explodes is a felony, make sure your kids don't:

1) Blow up a finished juice box and stomp on it.
2) Blow up a plastic bag and hit it.
3) Blow up and pop a balloon.
4) Pop bubble packaging wrap.
5) Blowing and popping bubble gum.

Those are all variations on the same theme. Now I get it, dry ice "bombs" can cause injury if used without a tiny bit of common sense. But then again, a staircase can be deadly if used incorrectly. But yes, I see the "safety" factor, but a felony? Are we serious?

Re:Watch out!

[blueg3]

If setting people's houses on fire is a felony, make sure you don't light a charcoal grill. It's a variation on the same theme.

"destructive device"

[v1]

That's the weak point of this particular law. It's one of those "vague, let the officers interpret it" laws, so in reality, the law isn't determining if what you are doing is illegal, the officers are, and that's not how the legal system is supposed to work.

If they wanted to drag this out, I'm sure their lawyer could mount their main attack on "destructive device" and pull a win, because it would be trivial to show that the term could apply to a wide variety of things that no reasonable person would consider unlawful. Once you show a law can be used to convict even one innocent person, the law becomes unenforceable in court.

They probably will simply get the charges dropped, because the cops usually like having vague laws like that on the books because it allows them to make more flexible judgement calls. (which can be good OR bad for the public, and that's the problem) They won't want this to go to court because they'll lose their bad (but useful) law if it does. Or at least get a precedent set against it on the books.

Another potential WMD

[dcsmith]

Wow - it's a good thing he wasn't caught releasing internally produced methane and igniting it. Mom could have been charged with feeding him beans.

A law I wish existed...

[DoofusOfDeath]

"Enemy of freedom and democracy". Citizens could arrest legislators, judges, heads of state, and law enforcement persons for violating the principles of a free and libertarian democracy.

The charges would be adjudicated by all citizens of the town, state, or country (whichever scope was more appropriate). If a majority of those voting agreed to convict, then the person in question would be banished or, if he so chose, could cut down a tree with a herring.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:Hyperbole or stupidity

[Cookie3]

Back in 1999, a teacher at my High School was injured because a kid thought a dry ice bomb in a trash can would be a "funny" prank. I don't know how much dry ice was placed in the soda bottles -- I suspect they were 2L bottles -- but he put several bottles of dry ice in different trash cans around the school:

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4179/is_19990402/ai_n11719980/

It's not mentioned in the article, but the teacher did suffer lacerations on his face -- an inch or two to either side, and he might have actually been blinded.

I don't see how you can not call it a bomb. It's a device that explodes. Improperly placed (or designed), and it can hurt innocent bystanders. Putting dry ice and water in a sealed bottle can *ONLY* result in an explosion. What else would you call it?

Re:Hyperbole or stupidity

[Cornelius the Great]

Dry ice in a soda bottle can be dangerous (especially if you point the cap at someone), but certainly not an act of terrorism.

It's funny how this story gets brought up right before the July 4 weekend- I can't buy any of the fireworks that I used to play with as a kid. I set off dry ice bombs at my high school with no police action resulted (this was before Columbine). I remember going out into the wilderness with a .22 rifle and hunting by myself at the age of 10. Had this been recent, my parents would be in the same boat as the mom in TFA.

We're depriving our youth of the dangers and the excitement resulting from a combination of intelligence, curiosity, and access to a lot of cool chemicals and explosive materials. Now that Darwin has been defanged, we're a nation of pussies.

I better go dismantle my potato cannon...

i'd like to propose an arrest:

[circletimessquare]

any proponent of libertarianism who wishes to whittle away government regulations until the power vacuum is filled by corporations, who are not interested in our freedom or democracy at all

my mom would be serving a life sentence

[alta]

Wow, is this what we're coming to? When I was a kid (34 now) I did all kinds of stuff that would now get someone in my family put in jail. It's not like I never got caught, it's just that people understood what 'boys will be boys' meant back then. Sure I didn't personally make a bomb (I would have) but you could have locked me up many times over for incendiary devices, or as I got older, reckless driving.

It's sad that it's come to this. How many of the worlds smartest people did dangerous things when they were kids? How many electrical engineers played with electricity? How many fire fighters played with fires? How many SWAT team members shot guns and made bombs? How many architects, civil engieers or constructions workers built forts out of wood the re-appropriated from their neighbors fences? How many lemon-aid stand kids are now rich capitalists?

Our government now only promotes mediocrity, not excellence.

SLightly more pressure than a balloon.

[purduephotog]

Contrary to the humorous jokes about popping balloons, mentos and coke, etc- these do have significant explosive force. When they're at full pressure they can maim. While the first google search of "dry ice bomb accident" turns up a youtube video of a small bottle, one can also see videos from Mythbusters where they used 2 liter containers.

Very quickly you can see that putting one of these inside of a mailbox can do serious damage.

These are no different than the drain bombs of my 'youth' when kids were stuffing them in mailboxes everywhere. Those did cause serious injuries- given the reaction of the lye and the shrapnel from the explosions.

Should Mom be charged? No, she shouldn't, and there should be some common sense applied. But since a 14 year old can't exactly buy dry ice (at least not at the places I fill my CO2 tanks at) then she was supplying him- and if she wasn't supervising him doing this... there is a degree of recklessness that needs to be addressed.

Maybe she doesn't understand how dangerous these things can be? I doubt the kid was wearing a face shield with gloves and an apron to protect himself incase of premature detonation.

As a society we all would pay if this child was injured. That's the overriding concern- and society would be screaming right now if the police had showed up, said "Oh, OK, keep at it" and left... and then the kid was in an accident and cost (lets say an eye) his sight.

You can't have it both ways.

don't play with cops, this is not a game

[Anonymous Coward]

If a cop asks you to delete a picture you should politely refuse to comply. If the cop is insistent you should suggest he consult his supervisor and then refuse to cooperate further except where non-cooperation could appear as threatening. For example, if the cop says "ON THE GROUND MOTHERFUCKER!" you should quickly get on the ground. If you are physically assaulted, state loudly and as clearly as possible that you are not resisting and request that they stop hurting you.
Also, it is very important to note any surveillance cameras which may be in the vicinity and to request that any witnesses record what is happening.
Above all, remain as calm as possible and never forget that standing up to tyranny is the greatest duty of every American.