Luke Isaac Terpstra, 30, of Grant, Michigan was arrested by police there earlier this month and charged with possessing bombs with unlawful intent. Salem Police Department in faraway Massachussets claim he was planning to bomb the Satanic Temple there, but was thwarted by his mother, who turned him in.
Terpstra’s stepfather saw the improvised explosives — some wrapped in shrapnel and ammunition — in a box while helping him move after he was evicted from his Grant residence, the station reported.
“Official attacks on us inspire and embolden deranged and sometimes violent people,” Lucien Greaves, The Satanic Temple’s co-founder and spokesperson, told The Herald Palladium. “In Michigan, where the would-be bomber is from, a congressman is attempting to pass a bill that seeks to provide a pretext to take away The Satanic Temple’s religious tax-exemption,” Greaves said.
CBS in Boston has more detail about the would-be terrorist’s plan to bomb the Satanic Temple and has some footage of his arrest and arraignment.
