Luke Helder
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Lucas John Helder (born May 5, 1981) was a University of Wisconsin-Stout college student and Pine Island, Minnesota resident who earned notoriety as the Midwestern pipe bomber of May, 2002. Helder tried to create a smiley face shape on the U.S. map in a pattern of pipe bombs which he placed in mailboxes and rigged to explode upon the boxes being opened. The police were looking for an unknown suspect supposedly driving around in a black Honda Accord. Bombs of his were found in Nebraska, Colorado, Texas, Illinois, and Iowa where six people were injured including four mail carriers. [1] Helder was captured in rural Nevada before he completed the full smile; at the time of his arrest the Leader-Telegram reported that he was wearing a Kurt Cobain T-Shirt [2].
Prior to his bombing spree, Helder was a member of a local three-piece Grunge band named Apathy. Even though the band was only locally successful, they recorded a CD named Sacks of People at the end of their first summer together which they funded and released themselves.
The bombings were heavily covered by the United States media and caused perhaps more of a public scare than they otherwise would have due to their occurring so recently after the September 11 terrorist attacks. When the news broke that Helder was the pipe bomber, the media made significant mention of his status as a musician. Many music critics scrambled to acquire copies of Apathy's CD, some of which were auctioned on Ebay for as much as $200. Material from an interview with Apathy bassist Eric Hielscher was even included in a Rolling Stone article on Helder.
While Helder wasn't at the top of his college class, his teachers described him as a reasonably good, quiet, and polite student and at first there was confusion as to what the motivation for the bombings could be. Within the year prior to his arrest, Helder had become passionate about astral projection techniques. He seems to have come to believe that death of the flesh and body is not the end of existence, as evidenced by a rambling essay he sent to The Badger Herald of the University of Wisconsin-Madison at the beginning of the bombing spree. The essay also includes sinister statements such as "I'm taking very drastic measure in attempt to provide this information to you... I will die/change in the end for this, but that's ok, hahaha paradise awaits! I'm dismissing a few individuals from reality, to change all of you for the better" and ending with the words "written before any of the bombs".
It later came to light that his actions were an attempt to garner media attention so that he could spread a message denouncing government control over daily lives and the illegality of marijuana as well as promoting astral projection as a method to reach a higher level of consciousness.
In April 2004 a federal judge found Helder incompetent to stand trial. While the judge could free Helder if doctors find he is not a threat to society, legal experts doubt this possibility due to the violent nature of his crimes. Luke Helder, inmate #36460-048, remains in the Federal Medical Center in Rochester, Minnesota. [3] [4]
