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posted by mrpg on Thursday January 18 2018, @10:11PM   Printer-friendly
from the random.choice() dept.

Jonathan Grant Thompson, the man behind the popular science-focused YouTube channel King of Random has been charged with two counts of second-degree felony possession of an explosive device.

Thompson, 37, runs the King of Random YouTube channel, boasting about 200 videos and 8.9 million subscribers. His videos are of science experiments and are in the vein of science-based shows on networks such as the Discovery Channel.

Thompson has been making videos and putting them on YouTube since 2010. His videos have garnered more than 1.6 billion combined views.

According to the article the first complaint "resulted from a citizen complaint via Facebook Messenger on June 15 about Thompson exploding a dry ice bomb", and for the second:

Thompson said a friend had left him a bag of powder, which he believed to be from a deconstructed firework.

After lighting a couple of small "control fires" Thompson and Timothy Burgess, 20, of Ontario, Canada, ignited a larger pile which exploded, the police report states. According to the report, firefighters heard the explosion from the nearby fire station.

Google Maps shows there is a South Jordan fire station 0.2 miles from Thompson's home.

The explosion left Burgess with small particles of burned material embedded in his arms, charges say.

Burgess was charged with one count of second-degree felony possession of an explosive device. Court records show prosecutors have asked a judge to issue a $15,000 warrant for his arrest

Originally spotted via AvE's channel.


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  • (Score: 5, Interesting) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Thursday January 18 2018, @10:23PM (8 children)

    by MichaelDavidCrawford (2339) Subscriber Badge <mdcrawford@gmail.com> on Thursday January 18 2018, @10:23PM (#624433) Homepage Journal

    - at UC Santa Cruz.

    "Where did you steal the chemicals?" asked my arresting officer.

    "I bought them at Bryant Labs in Berkeley. Here's the receipt."

    I was in the police station for a while, during which I sang like a bird. My reason? The cop who interviewed me left the California Criminal Code on my side of his desk, open to the explosives section.

    I could readily see that I had committed five felonies, each of which had a three-year minimum sentence.

    At my arraignment I was released on my own recognizance. That means I didn't have to pay bail.

    At the first preliminary hearing the prosecutor laughed and said "He was just doing over-eager research." Then he proposed I plead guilty for possession of noxious chemicals with the intent to teargas a theater. That was the closest they could come to explosives while charging me only with a misdemeanor.

    The judge very sternly said to me "I urge you to use your powerful intellect for the benefit of society.

    That's one of the reasons I write so much, on a variety of topics.

    In the end I got sixty hours of community service. I devoted that time to making geometric sculptures out of painted wooden dowels and hot glue.

    A friend who was into making latex masks was given community service when he was caught siphoning gas out of a truck that belonged to UCSC. He devoted his "service" to making masks for a theater company. They paid for the materials; he got to keep the molds.

    I was making Hexamethyline Triperoxy Diamine. It is dead-sample to make and so is the most popular detonator for suicide bombers. One of the ingredients is any flavor of Kool-Ade mix other than lemon.

    --
    Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
    Starting Score:    1  point
    Moderation   +4  
       Interesting=4, Total=4
    Extra 'Interesting' Modifier   0  
    Karma-Bonus Modifier   +1  

    Total Score:   5  
  • (Score: 5, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 18 2018, @11:33PM (7 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 18 2018, @11:33PM (#624470)

    Here, we're always being told to never talk to cops, and it worked out for both of us. I know another person, not even committing a crime, who refused to talk and thus spent some time in jail.

    My story:

    I also made HMTD. I set a small amount off in my room on purpose, but then an open container about a foot away got hit by the shockwave. That was about 4 grams, enough to make a crater 1/4 inch deep in a concrete floor and spread my blood on all 4 walls and the ceiling. The hospital called the cops, a detective questioned me, and that was the end of that. My home didn't even get searched, and now I have a security clearance.

    A key factor may be that I was 17 years old and it was 1991 or 1992, back before the Oklahoma City bombing and long before the World Trade Center got hit. Go back another 30 years, and I'm told you could take a rifle to many schools. There was a time when dynamite could be bought at every hardware store.

    FYI, Kool-Ade is a terrible source of acid. Good preparation involves sulfuric acid and 30% peroxide, but citric acid and 6% peroxide will do nicely. For example...

    Avoid all metal, particularly that which contains copper. Tape a 1-cup container into a bowl. Put ice water in the bowl to be extra safe, not that you likely need it with citric acid and 6% peroxide. Put a half cup of 6% peroxide into the cup. Crush up hexamethylene tablets, commonly available as solid camp stove fuel. Put 2 tablespoons and 2/3 teaspoon of hexamethylene into the cup. Stir it to dissolve. In case your fuel tablets contain wax, stir with a motion that won't get wax stuck to the container. Add a quarter cup of citric acid, then stir to dissolve. Immediately filter it with a coffee filter, keeping the liquid. (this removes bits of wax and other crap) Let it sit for a day or two, forming crystals. Filter it again, with a new clean filter, this time keeping the solids. Wash it several times, first with water and then with alcohol. Let it dry.

    HMTD is hard to set off by impact. I couldn't do it with a hammer. It is very easy to ignite. If in a very thin layer, it will flash like gunpower, but more energetic. If slightly confined, for example in an unsealed pen cap or under a credit card, it will transition to Mach 25 detonation. It becomes inert after a couple months.

    • (Score: 3, Informative) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday January 19 2018, @12:19AM (2 children)

      by The Mighty Buzzard (18) Subscriber Badge <themightybuzzard@proton.me> on Friday January 19 2018, @12:19AM (#624487) Homepage Journal

      Go back another 30 years, and I'm told you could take a rifle to many schools.

      If you didn't see at least a quarter of the trucks there with a shotgun and a rifle in their gun rack at my highschool on any given day, it's because school wasn't in session. This wasn't but twenty-some-odd years ago.

      --
      My rights don't end where your fear begins.
      • (Score: 3, Informative) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Friday January 19 2018, @06:15AM

        by MichaelDavidCrawford (2339) Subscriber Badge <mdcrawford@gmail.com> on Friday January 19 2018, @06:15AM (#624593) Homepage Journal

        They actually set up a shooting range inside the gym.

        This was in Moscow, Idaho. The instructor told us that hunting was so popular in Idaho that everyone agreed that gun safety should be taught in schools.

        --
        Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
      • (Score: 2) by captain normal on Friday January 19 2018, @06:05PM

        by captain normal (2205) on Friday January 19 2018, @06:05PM (#624803)

        I was in high school way back in the late 1950s, in West Texas. The guys who had Pickups all had gun racks. Even those of us who had regular cars had at least a 22 rifle in the trunk.

        --
        When life isn't going right, go left.
    • (Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Friday January 19 2018, @06:12AM

      by MichaelDavidCrawford (2339) Subscriber Badge <mdcrawford@gmail.com> on Friday January 19 2018, @06:12AM (#624591) Homepage Journal

      The same compound is the active ingredient in Ortho Snail And Slug Death. Under the name Methenamine it's used to treat women's urinary tract infections.

      The guy at Bryant labs knew what HMTA was, and said he'd get a two kilogram bottle sent up from their warehouse in LA. It was quite cheap, and enough precursor to make a huge explosion.

      Fortunately for me I knew how dangerous it was and so only synthesized a very small amount at any one time. The prosecutor told the judge that it was "The explosive equivalent of an ounce of black powder".

      I was very fortunate in that I planned to buy a fifty pound sack of Ammonium Nitrate as well as several cans of powdered aluminum - but I had not made the actual purchases.

      I would have gotten the aluminum for a paint store. It's available with many different tints for mixing up your own metallic paint.

      --
      Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 19 2018, @08:22AM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 19 2018, @08:22AM (#624616)

      Let me make a random statement that I believe is true: GP is white, and so are you.

      • (Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 19 2018, @09:19AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 19 2018, @09:19AM (#624626)

        If that made any difference, it was only because we knew not to tell the cops "Fuck yo ass I'ma kill yo muthafucker." and charge at them. We were not raised to misbehave in this foolish manner.

        That's enough racism for me today. Hopefully you can stop as well. There was no need to assume that race played any role in that interaction.

    • (Score: 2) by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us on Friday January 19 2018, @05:58PM

      by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us (6553) on Friday January 19 2018, @05:58PM (#624800) Journal

      But that it "worked out" for you and MDC... what is that attributable to? If the prosecutor involved in your case had wanted to bolster his or her public image to appear "tough on bombmakers" do you think it would have worked out so well? If you had been friends with the cop or prosecutor and/or had a parent who was politically connected, might you have not been prosecuted at all? And, if you had stood mute or demanded that you have representation, would that have changed your sentences or could it have not mattered in that sense? Could you have gotten off entirely with the right lawyer?

      That said, I sympathize. If I'm breaking a traffic law and a cop pulls me over, I'm very inclined to admit to the cop that I was busted fairly. (Or be genuinely confused if I really didn't know what was up.) At least twice I've walked away unticketed / with a warning, and I'd like to think it was because I was cooperative. (The second circumstance was driving without seatbelt on my way home from the hospital three weeks after surgery in a region the belt was on.) On a third occasion I know that the department's policy was to always let a first offense with no immediate priors go with a warning.

      --
      This sig for rent.