Orlando(US): A US Army veteran arrested after trying to check luggage containing pipe bomb-making materials onto a flight home explained that he wanted to show his friends there how to make them, authorities said.
Investigators were questioning whether Kevin Christopher Brown had ever been to Iraq - where he told them he d seen similar bombs made, according to court documents - and looking into his mental health history after his arrest on Tuesday at Orlando International Airport.
Authorities and airline officials repeated their assurances yesterday that passengers were never in danger. Transportation Security Administration officials nonetheless touted the 32-year-old's arrest as a victory for new covert screening techniques involving plainclothes officers mingling with travelers.
Brown first told authorities he wanted to detonate the materials on a tree stump in Jamaica, but later said he was going to show friends in his home country how to build explosives like he saw in Iraq, according to an FBI criminal complaint.
Brown did not speak at a brief court hearing yesterday where he was ordered held without bail. Clarence Counts, his court-appointed public defender, declined to comment as he prepared for a formal bond hearing today.
Brown, a Jamaican national, joined the Army in June 1999 and was discharged in December 2003, said Army spokesman Majore Nathan Banks. Brown was stationed in Germany and was most recently a logistical specialist with the 690th Medical Company based in Fort Benning, Georgia, Banks said.
