Pipe bomb suspect on suicide watch

Wednesday, May 8, 2002 | 11:02 a.m.

SUN STAFF AND WIRE REPORTS

Luke J. Helder was on a suicide watch in a Reno jail today after his father and an alert motorist aided in the pipe-bombing suspect's arrest Tuesday.

Helder, 21, of Pine Island, Minn., was arrested after a high-speed chase along Interstate 80 and a cell phone call to his parents.

Early today a handcuffed Helder was led into the Washoe County Jail by four federal agents. Wearing a black Kurt Cobain T-shirt and long, baggy tan shorts, his hair mussed, Helder was quiet.

"Luke, do you have anything to say to the media?" one reporter said.

"No," Helder said, looking up. He answered the same way when asked if he had anything to tell his parents.

Helder was expected to go before a federal magistrate today in Reno, where he is likely to be held for a few days before being transported to face charges in the five-day mail pipe bomb case that left six people injured. Eighteen pipe bombs were found in mail boxes from Illinois to Texas.

Washoe County Sheriff Dennis Balaam said today that Helder was on suicide watch in the county jail.

The FBI sent out an all-points bulletin to law enforcement agencies throughout Nevada on Tuesday after a reported sighting of Helder in Cedar City, Utah.

About 4 p.m. Tuesday authorities tracked a cell phone spike in Battle Mountain believed to have originated from Helder, Nevada Highway Patrol spokesman Alan Davidson said.

A citizen reportedly spotted a 1992 Honda Accord on I-80 that matched the description of the car that Helder was driving, the FBI said. The citizen called the Pershing County sheriff. Highway Patrol officers soon arrived and Helder ended his cross-country drive, Davidson said.

"He pulled over and gave up, and that was the end of it," Davidson said.

Helder dropped at least one gun out the car window as he surrendered, Davidson said.

Terry Hulse, special agent in charge of the Las Vegas FBI office, said that he had been in contact Monday night with other Western-based FBI offices about the possibility of Helder heading West.

"I spent about an hour on the phone with Phoenix and Los Angeles, talking about what if he came our way," Hulse said. "He was in Illinois and then Nebraska, so it wasn't that hard to believe that he could be headed toward the Southwest."

Authorities put out an alert after Helder's father, Cameron, called police late Monday about a letter from his son that contained reference to the bombings, Menomonie, Wis., Police Chief Dennis Beety said today.

Investigators said they believe Helder, who studied art at the University of Wisconsin-Stout in Menomonie, was responsible for all the bombs, which injured six people on Friday and rattled nerves across the Midwest. Residents were asked to leave their mailboxes open and report any suspicious items to the police.

Investigators said Helder apparently drove his fathe car 3,000 miles across the country since Friday.

Tuesday afternoon, Cameron Helder defended his son before reporters and urged the young man to turn himself in.

"I really want you to know that Luke is not a dangerous person," the elder Helder, wearing sunglasses and a baseball jacket, said in a brief statement outside his home. "I think he's just trying to make a statement about the way our government is run. I think Luke wants people to listen to his ideas, and not enough people are hearing him and he thinks this may help.

"Please don't hurt anyone else," Cameron Helder added in an appeal to his son. "It's time to talk. You have the attention you wanted. We want you home safe."

The U.S. attorney in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, charged Helder Tuesday night with using an explosive to maliciously destroy property affecting interstate commerce and using a destructive device to commit a crime of violence, charges that could send him to prison for life. Officials said he would also be charged in Illinois and Nebraska, but were unsure where he would be taken first.

The student newspaper at the University of Wisconsin, The Badger-Herald, reported Tuesday night on its website that it had received a six-page letter from Helder, postmarked in Omaha on Friday, and had turned it over to the FBI. The first page was identical to the notes attached to the bombs, and the rest include further ramblings on the meaning of life and death and ruminations on the environment and technology.

"I often wonder why so many people spend their entire lives consuming what is fed to them, without knowing if they are consuming anything at all," the letter said. "All of my family and friends were raised to believe ... to be gullible ... to be materialistic ... to fear authority ... to blindly follow.

"Do you wonder why people blow themselves up to hurt others?" it continued. "Do you wonder why you are here? Do you wonder what is out there ... way out there? I remember those days of uncertainty, and I can't tell you how great it is to know, to know eternally, and to be."

The suspect's identity, and a yearbook-style photograph showing him smiling between a crew cut and bright yellow and black tie, confounded terrorism experts who had thought the threatening anti-government notes that accompanied the bombs were authored by an older man. Helder, who used to play in a grunge rock band in Minnesota, does not fit the profile of a bomber, and he has no criminal record, though he was questioned in one incident while a juvenile.

University officials said he stopped attending classes three weeks ago, returned briefly, then left the campus a week ago.

"He is being described as an intelligent young man with strong family ties," Jim Bogner, the FBI's special agent in charge of Nebraska and Iowa, said at an afternoon news conference in Omaha. "The investigation continues, and at this stage, we need to talk to Luke Helder."

Law enforcement officials said they were encouraged that the bombs found over the weekend in Nebraska and on Monday in Colorado and Texas were not set to explode, unlike those discovered Friday in a ring of Iowa and Illinois communities straddling the Mississippi River.

"It appears there is some bit of de-escalation in terms of the violence," said Mark James, special agent in charge of the Kansas City office of the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. "It appears that the Nebraska ones were more in the realm of sending a message, versus intending to harm people."