Domestic Terrorism and Explosives

Federal prosecutors say a police response to reports of loud booms in a White Plains, New York neighborhood early Monday led officers to an apartment where they found at least 25 improvised explosive devices. According to a federal criminal complaint, 65‑year‑old Raymond Elders had a bluish‑black chemical residue on his hands and was holding a lighter when officers encountered him inside, and an officer outside had already seen what appeared to be a pipe bomb on the front steps and smelled an acrid burning odor. A search of the apartment uncovered more than two dozen devices, and surveillance video from earlier in March allegedly shows a man believed to be Elders lighting an explosive device on the sidewalk and throwing it into the street before an explosion. Elders, who has prior felony convictions, is charged with use of a weapon of mass destruction, manufacturing destructive devices, and unlawful possession of those devices and explosives after felony convictions; a judge ordered him held in custody as a flight risk and danger to the community at his initial court appearance Tuesday. The case underscores continuing concerns about homemade explosives in residential areas and the threshold for bringing rarely used federal weapons‑of‑mass‑destruction charges in domestic bomb cases.