By The Herald Editorial Board
One criminal attack that hasn’t received as much coverage as others — likely because it happened two days after the Boston Marathon bombing — was the deadly fertilizer plant explosion on April 17, 2013, in the rural town of West, Texas.
Fifteen people were killed, including 10 first responders and two volunteers, more than 200 people were injured and more than 500 homes in a 37-block area were leveled, creating a crater 93 feet wide and 12 feet deep. The blast caused a 2.1-magnitude earthquake, according to news reports. Coverage may also have been subdued because the explosion was assumed to be an industrial accident, and the exhaustive investigation took three years.
But last May, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives announced that the blast was caused by a “criminal act.” All natural and accidental causes were ruled out. However, federal regulators earlier issued a report that found inadequate emergency response coordination and training and careless storage of potentially explosive materials contributed to the blast. Making it that much easier for the arsonist(s). The fire at West Fertilizer burned for 20 minutes before the explosion that led to the deaths of the first responders.
“It was like a nuclear bomb went off,” West Mayor Tommy Muska said.
The ATF is offering a $50,000 reward to help find the perpetrator(s).
“I think we’re on the right path; that’s why we’re coming today to announce our ruling and ask for the public’s help,” Robert Elder, a special agent with the ATF, said during the announcement last May.
Definitely a criminal act, but it seems fair to go ahead and call it terrorism, whether it turns out to be caused by domestic or foreign criminals. Or both. Terrorism is terrorism. Intentionally creating an inferno that killed 15 people, injured 200 and flattened homes has to be terrorism.
Under current law, as written in the Patriot Act, acts of domestic terrorism are those which: “(A) involve acts dangerous to human life that are a violation of the criminal laws of the United States or of any State; (B) appear to be intended – (i) to intimidate or coerce a civilian population; (ii) to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion; or (iii) to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination, or kidnapping; and (C) occur primarily within the territorial jurisdiction of the United States.
So, when Texan Andrew Joseph Stack II, 53, flew his small aircraft into a building that housed an IRS office in 2010, killing himself and IRS manager Vernon Hunter, and injuring 13 others, it could have easily been called domestic terrorism, but it wasn’t; it was labeled “an isolated event.” (It would be wrong if the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks set some kind of bar, such as more than one plane must be involved to be labeled terrorism, foreign or domestic.)
It’s time to treat all terrorism the same, semantically and otherwise, rather than assuming different degrees of criminality depending on where the killers might come from, especially if means domestic terrorists are somehow seen as less dangerous than foreign ones.
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