Man charged in bomb scare idolized Okla. City bomber
HOPEWELL TOWNSHIP » A man charged with creating a bomb scare Thursday at a township apartment complex had praised Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh as a “true comrade” in a series of disturbing social media ramblings in which he railed against law enforcement and the president and threatened to commit mass murder.
Masanoly Aiken, 56, faces charges after he left a package outside the mailroom of the Hopewell Gardens apartments on Denow Road, authorities said. The package had suspicious writing on it and led to the evacuation of the building as Hopewell police, fire officials and members of the state police’s bomb squad responded to the complex shortly before 5 p.m.
After two hours, the empty package was determined to be harmless, officials said.
Police developed a “person of interest,” leading to the arrest of the 56-year-old Hopewell Gardens resident who was charged with creating a false public alarm, terroristic threats and causing or risking widespread injury or damage.
Authorities determined around 7 p.m. the package wasn’t dangerous after state police deployed a robot equipped with a camera to check the package.
A bomb-sniffing dog from the Mercer County Sheriff’s Department K9 unit swept the building to ensure it was safe for residents to return to their homes. They were let back in the building at 7:25 p.m., police said in a news release.
Hopewell police chief Lance Maloney told The Trentonian the suspicious cardboard package had “what if this was a bomb” written on it in black marker.
The chief said some of the common areas of the apartment complex are monitored by surveillance cameras but the mailroom wasn’t one of them. Investigators tied the package to Aiken because handwriting on the box appeared to match a note card Aiken is suspected of leaving under the property manager’s office door, Maloney said.
The chief couldn’t say what the note said or whether it was left the same day as the package.
Investigators are still trying to figure out what motivated Aiken but they believe he may have been upset by “things on the news,” Maloney said. Aiken was interviewed at police headquarters, but Maloney wouldn’t reveal what he told investigators.
Residents hadn’t reported any problems with Aiken, but he had called cops over a noise complaint in the past and phoned the department again this month believing someone stole his clothes from one of the complex’s dryers. He later found his clothes, Maloney said.
Aiken’s Facebook page is littered with references to McVeigh, the executed Oklahoma City bomber convicted of committing one of the deadliest terrorist attacks in U.S. history when in 1995 he blew up the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building killing 168 people.
“I’m for McVeigh” read one of Aiken’s posts.
On Feb. 27, he wrote, “I surely miss Timothy McVeigh [sic] a true comrade an honest American beven [sic] the sun burn the West coast’s [sic] by California well now you got jobs.”
In a series of unpunctuated and incoherent messages on Aiken’s Facebook page, he appears to