Should it be illegal to make a fake bomb?

[RobinFinderson]

Take a spent printer cartridge. Carefully open it up and empty out the toner. Wash everything, because you don't want to get toner all over your clothes. Fill the cartridge with silly putty. Press two wires into the silly putty so that they dangle outside of the printer cartridge. Now carefully screw the cartridge closed with wires protruding. Attach one wire to the positive lead of a 9-volt battery. Duct tape the other wire to a mobile phone. Duct tape a third wire to the phone and to the negative lead on the battery. Use additional duct tape to make the whole device as neat looking as possible. Crazy glue a blinking red LED to the package. Put into your luggage and head out on business trip.

Question: Should this be illegal?

[Flystripper]

should not be illegal to make it but should be illegal to take it on a plane.

[TripletDaddy]

Yes.

[RobinFinderson]

should not be illegal to make it but should be illegal to take it on a plane.

I'm talking about taking it on the plane. Should it be illegal to put this into your suitcase to carry on a plane.

So, you say that it should be illegal. The law would have to say something like, "It is illegal to bring fake bombs onto an airplane." But what exactly constitutes a 'fake bomb?' I'm reminded of that publicity stunt a technology company pulled a few years ago where they left blinking objects all over the city (wasn't it Boston?). The nature of some of these was misunderstood, and they caused a bomb scare. One person's 'fake bomb' is another person's cool DIY electronic gadget.

So how would a law define 'fake bomb?'

[RobinFinderson]

Yes.

I agree. The question I have is this: How do we write the law so that it works? In other words, what legally constitutes a fake bomb?

[TripletDaddy]

I agree. The question I have is this: How do we write the law so that it works? In other words, what legally constitutes a fake bomb?

Have you read FAA regulations? I haven't. Currently, I'm not even sure what you described is illegal. It will get you detained and questioned but I don't think that it is illegal per se to put something like that in your luggage.

[YOhio]

It should be illegal to waste silly putty in such a non-silly activity.

[RobinFinderson]

Have you read FAA regulations? I haven't. Currently, I'm not even sure what you described is illegal. It will get you detained and questioned but I don't think that it is illegal per se to put something like that in your luggage.

In addition to getting you detained and questioned, it could also shut down the flight and airport. In THIS case reported by the NYT, it apparently wasn't a fake, and the plane went on to make its flight sans luggage.

The reason all of this interests me is because I am wondering about what sorts of LEGAL things terrorist sympathizers could do to gum up traffic/airports/high security places. What if al Quaeda were to develop a legal wing of terrorist mischief? Such a wing could cause a lot of disruption, and the sympathizers could live openly and hide behind constitutional protections. I'm just trying to figure out how we can protect the country from something like this. I'm wondering if it is just a matter of time before something like this happens.

[BoylenOver]

I'm not sure if fake bombs should be illegal, but Congress needs to do something about the high price of printer cartridges! Yowza!

[Indy Coug]

If the silly putty contained transferred images of Mary Worth or Family Circus, then yes.

[I.J. Reilly]

My guess is that there are laws that would adequately address some such scenario. The laws would probably allow them to prevent you from getting on a plane with such a device. Should you get on with the device and cause some sort of panic, there are probably available laws to have you jailed and hit with a stiff fine if you intended to cause the panic. The most gray area would probably be if you had something that resembled a bomb, knew that it would cause a panic if discovered, but had no such intent.

This is all pure speculation on my part, of course.

[creekster]

My guess is that there are laws that would adequately address some such scenario. The laws would probably allow them to prevent you from getting on a plane with such a device. Should you get on with the device and cause some sort of panic, there are probably available laws to have you jailed and hit with a stiff fine if you intended to cause the panic. The most gray area would probably be if you had something that resembled a bomb, knew that it would cause a panic if discovered, but had no such intent.

This is all pure speculation on my part, of course.

I am sure it would be considered some sort of terroristic threat.

[BigPiney]

It should be illegal to waste silly putty in such a non-silly activity.

That is something we can all agree on.

[wuapinmon]

This reminds me of that Deep Thoughts:

Sometimes when I feel like killing someone, I do a little trick to calm myself down. I'll go over to the person's house and ring the doorbell. When the person comes to the door, I'm gone, but you know what I've left on the porch? A jack-o-lantern with a knife stuck in the side of its head with a note that says "You." After that I usually feel a lot better, and no harm done.

This would be a "hate crime" maybe.

I wonder if you stuck a sheet of paper in your luggage that said, "Dear TSA Employee, this piece of paper is a bomb," what would happen. I agree that no one should do this, but how should we write a law that makes doing something designed to shut the system down illegal.

Good stuff, Robin.

[creekster]

This reminds me of that Deep Thoughts:



This would be a "hate crime" maybe.

I wonder if you stuck a sheet of paper in your luggage that said, "Dear TSA Employee, this piece of paper is a bomb," what would happen. I agree that no one should do this, but how should we write a law that makes doing something designed to shut the system down illegal.

Good stuff, Robin.

This really isn't that hard. Doing something designed to shut the system down, as you say, is illegal already. I am quite confident that a prosecutor would find numerous violations in such an act. It would be about the same as calling in a bomb threat to a school when there is no bomb. It might be harder to prove intent in court, but in this day and age any bozo that puts silly putty in a printer cartridge and attaches it to a cell phone and tosses it in his suitcase should plan on spending some quality time in a cell. You cant make terroristic threats. You cant interfere with public transportation. You cant make bomb threats. Put simply, this act would qualify as all/any of those.