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San Diego - Pipe-bomb Story Updated -Man pleads not guilty to I-5 pipe bomb charges
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by comoms | November 2, 2007 at 02:36 pm
3664 views | 10 Recommendations | 2 comments
Updated 11/8/2007
VISTA
-- An Oceanside ex-convict who police say left two pipe bombs near
Interstate 5 pleaded not guilty Tuesday to nine felony counts tied
mostly to homemade bombs.
The incident caused authorities to shut down the freeway for more than two hours Friday during the afternoon commute.
Michael
Peter Buffalo, 46, sat silently in the Vista courthouse Tuesday
afternoon during his short arraignment on charges linking him to the
freeway bombs as well as a bomb found days earlier at an Oceanside home
in the city's downtown area.
Oceanside
police said they learned of the freeway bombs when they questioned
Buffalo about a tip that he planned blow up the Vista courthouse -- the
same courthouse where Buffalo has been sentenced to prison six times
since 1987.
In court Tuesday, San Diego Superior Court Judge
Adrienne Orfield granted the prosecution's request to set Buffalo's
bail at $5 million -- an amount higher than has been set for some
accused murderers in the area.
Deputy District Attorney Natalie
Villaflor said outside of court that she asked for the high amount
because Buffalo "is a danger to the community."
"He had a plan
and it looks like he had the means to carry it out," Villaflor said.
"He had a plan to do something with those bombs."
She declined to say what Buffalo's alleged plan may have been.
On
Friday, Oceanside police said Buffalo told them about the two bombs he
had ditched in a backpack along I-5 just south of La Jolla Village
Drive where his van broke down three days prior.
Once they found
the bag with the homemade explosives, the San Diego Police Department
bomb squad shut down the freeway and blew up the bag three times.
Authorities
closed down the major north-south artery for more than two hours on a
busy afternoon, leading to massive traffic backups.
Villaflor
said police have also linked Buffalo with a bomb found in a garage two
days earlier on the 500 block of N. Ditmar Road.
A search of Buffaloís residence in the 3400 block of Dunes Place turned up no other explosives, police said.
The thin, balding Buffalo appeared in court in a wheelchair. Villaflor said she did not know why.
Buffalo
has a number of felony convictions on his record, although none of them
are violent felonies. His previous convictions include possession of
drugs, stolen property and evading police.
Buffalo has crossed
through state prison turnstiles six times, but none of those crimes
were serious enough to leave strikes on his record.
Villaflor
said Buffalo may not be a candidate for the Three Strikes law, which is
an automatic sentence of 25 years to life in prison.
If Buffalo
is convicted of the bomb charges, he faces up to 12 years in prison.
And should he get out of prison and commit more crime, the conviction
in the bomb case would count as a strike on his record.
In and
out of prison for the last two decades, his longest stretch outside of
California prison walls came between 1996 and 2003. All of his cases in
San Diego County were handled at the courthouse in Vista.
Four
years ago, he was sent to prison to serve a three-year sentence on
charges including possession of drugs, receiving stolen property,
evading police and driving a stolen car and weapons possession.
Contact staff writer Teri Figueroa at (760) 631-6624 or tfigueroa[@]nctimes.com.
Update 7pm -The 5 Freeway was reopened at about 5pm. Authorities did find what was believed to be a pipe bomb and detonated the device. You can read the updated story here. http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/metro/20071102-1701-bn02pipebom2.html
-------------------------------------------------
UPDATE FROM CHP - 3:40
Alert: I-5 Northbound is now open but traffic is
stop-and-go all the way to the I-8 connector. I-5 Southbound is still closed
between SR-52 and the I-805 Merge due to the discovery of a suspicious device
found along I-5 Southbound near Genessee Avenue. The fire department and
bomb team are investigating
SIG ALERT MAP - http://www.sigalert.com/map.asp?Region=San+Diego
SAN DIEGO – An Oceanside arrest Thursday has led to the closure of Interstate 5 in both directions Friday while authorities investigate what might be a pipe bomb.* Traffic map/report
Authorities closed the freeway between Interstate 805 and state Route 52 about 12:30 p.m. while they determine if the device on the southbound lanes of I-5 at Genesee Avenue is a pipe bomb.
Southbound traffic was backed up to Carmel Valley Road while northbound traffic is backed up to Sea World Drive, with speeds as low as 1 mph.
Sheriff's bomb-arson investigators were called to help Oceanside Police with their investigation at 6:50 a.m., sheriff's Lt. William Donahue said.
Maurice Luque, a San Diego Fire-Rescue spokesman, said the closure is related to Thursday's an arrest of a man who had a pipe bomb in his possession.
The man told the Oceanside police officers who arrested him that he had another pipe bomb that he tossed out of a window on I-5 near Genesee Avenue, Luque said.
On Friday, authorities brought the man to the freeway site where he said he tossed the device, Luque said.
Oceanside Police Sgt. Leonard Mata would not confirm the incident and said there was no information on the investigation or the original arrest that he could immediately release.
Officials said sheriff's bomb-arson investigators will determine if the device is real and safely remove it. Authorities had no word on how long the freeway would be closed.
Here is a useful comment from the article:
"I'm at UCSD right now and the traffic is a MESS. On campus &
La Jolla Village Dr are parking lots. And even the overpass over to the
East side of campus (Preuss School, Thornton Hospital, Moores Cancer
Center etc) appears to be blocked."
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Most RecentMost Recommended Comments (2)
at 07:13 on November 3rd, 2007
comoms, thanks for posting and updating this. (I'm a UCSD alum)
at 15:37 on November 3rd, 2007
No problem - Although I don't believe it was related, it was strange that this occured the same day as the incident at the Arizona Nuclear facility.