George Peter Metesky (November 2, 1903 – May 23, 1994), better known as the Mad Bomber, was an American electrician and mechanic who terrorized New York City for 16 years in the 1940s and 1950s with explosives that he planted in theaters, terminals, libraries and offices. Bombs were left in phone booths, storage lockers and restrooms in public buildings, including Grand Central Terminal, Pennsylvania Station, Radio City Music Hall, the New York Public Library, the Port Authority Bus Terminal and the RCA Building, and in the New York City Subway. Metesky also bombed movie theaters, where he cut into seat upholstery and slipped his explosive devices inside.

Angry and resentful about events surrounding a workplace injury suffered years earlier, Metesky planted at least 33 bombs, of which 22 exploded, injuring 15 people.

The hunt for the bomber enlisted an early use of offender profiling. He was apprehended in 1957 on the basis of clues given in letters he wrote to a newspaper. He was found legally insane and committed to a state mental hospital.

Early life and industrial injury

George was born on November 2, 1903, in Waterbury, Connecticut, to two Lithuanian immigrants, George and Anna Milauskas. He was the youngest of three siblings. Following World War I, Metesky joined the U.S. Marines, serving as a specialist electrician at the <!---->United States Consulate in [[Shanghai. Returning home, he went to work as a mechanic for a subsidiary of the Consolidated Edison utility company and lived in Waterbury, Connecticut, with his two unmarried sisters. In 1931, Metesky was working as a generator wiper at the company's Hell Gate generating plant when a boiler backfire produced a blast of hot gases. The blast knocked Metesky down and the fumes filled his lungs, choking him.

Bombs

thumb|right|[[Pennsylvania Station (1910–1963)|Pennsylvania Station]]

Metesky's bombs were gunpowder-filled pipe bombs, ranging in size from long and from in diameter. Most used timers constructed from flashlight batteries and cheap pocket watches. Investigators at bomb sites learned to look for wool socks, which Metesky used to transport the bombs and sometimes to hang them from a rail or projection. with an ignition mechanism composed of sugar and flashlight batteries and enclosed in a wooden toolbox. It was found before it could detonate. The bomb was wrapped in a note written in distinctive block letters and signed "F.P.", stating

Some investigators wondered whether the bomb was an intentional dud, as if it had exploded, the note would have been obliterated.

In September 1941, a bomb with a similar ignition mechanism was found lying in the street about five blocks away from the Consolidated Edison headquarters building at 4 Irving Place. This bomb had no note and was also a dud. Police theorized that the bomber might have spotted a police officer and dropped the bomb without setting its fuse. The long hiatus since the last bomb and the improved construction techniques of the first new bomb led investigators to believe that the bomber had served in the military.

For his new wave of bombings, Metesky mainly chose public buildings as targets, bombing several of them multiple times. Bombs were left in phone booths, storage lockers and restrooms in public buildings including Grand Central Terminal (five times), Pennsylvania Station (five times), Radio City Music Hall (thrice), the New York Public Library (twice), the Port Authority Bus Terminal (twice) and the RCA Building, as well as in the New York City Subway. Metesky also bombed movie theaters, where he cut into seat upholstery and slipped his explosive devices inside. In April, Metesky's next bomb exploded without injury in a telephone booth in the New York Public Library. In August, a phone-booth bomb exploded without injury at Grand Central Station.

Police dismissed the event as the work of "boys or pranksters". The New York Times reported the event in the following day's issue, although only with a three-paragraph brief at the bottom of page 24.

Metesky next planted a bomb that exploded without injury in a phone booth at the Consolidated Edison headquarters building at 4 Irving Place. He also mailed one bomb, which did not explode, to Consolidated Edison from White Plains, New York.

On October 22, the New York Herald Tribune received a letter in penciled block letters stating:

The letter directed police to the Paramount Theater in Times Square, where a bomb was discovered and disabled, and to a telephone booth at Pennsylvania Station where nothing was found.

On November 28, a coin-operated locker at the IRT 14th Street subway station was bombed, without injury. Near the end of the year, the Herald Tribune received another letter, warning: An unexploded bomb was found in a rental locker at Pennsylvania Station.

1954

A bomb wedged behind a sink in a Grand Central Terminal men's room exploded in March, slightly injuring three men.

A bomb planted in a phone booth at the Port Authority Bus Terminal exploded with no injuries. Another bomb was discovered in a phone booth that was removed from Pennsylvania Station for repair.

As a capacity Radio City Music Hall audience of 6,200 watched Bing Crosby's White Christmas on November 7, a bomb stuffed into the bottom cushion of a seat in the 15th row exploded, injuring four patrons. The explosion was muffled by the heavy upholstery, and only those nearby heard it. While the film continued, the injured were escorted to the facility's first-aid room and about 50 people in the immediate area were moved to the back of the theater. After the film and the following stage show concluded 90 minutes later, the police searched for evidence in the 150-seat area nearest to the explosion.

1955

A bomb exploded without injuries on the platform at the IRT Sutter Avenue subway station in Brooklyn.<!-- it didn't make the Times--> A bomb hung beneath a phone booth shelf exploded on the main floor of Macy's department store, with no injuries. Two bombs exploded without injuries at Pennsylvania Station, one in a rental locker and one in a phone booth. A bomb was found at Radio City Music Hall after a warning phone call.

At the Roxy Theater, a bomb dropped from a slashed seat onto an upholsterer's workbench without exploding. A seat bomb exploded at the Paramount Theater, where one patron was struck on the shoe by bomb fragments but avoided injury. Investigators discovered a small penknife pushed inside the seat, one of several found at theater-seat bombings. They theorized that the bomber left his knives behind in case he was stopped and questioned. In December, a bomb exploded without injuries in a Grand Central men's-room stall.

1956

thumb|upright=.6|RCA Building

thumb|upright=1.4|[[New York Public Library Main Branch|New York Public Library]]

A 74-year-old men's-room attendant at Pennsylvania Station was seriously injured when a bomb in a toilet bowl exploded. A young man had reported an obstruction and the attendant tried to clear it using a plunger. Among the porcelain fragments, investigators found a watch frame and a wool sock.

A guard at the RCA Building in Rockefeller Center discovered a piece of pipe about five inches long in a telephone booth. A second guard thought it might be useful in a plumbing project and took it home on the bus to New Jersey, where it exploded on his kitchen table early the next morning. No one was injured.

A December 2 bombing at the Paramount Theater in Brooklyn left six of the theater's 1,500 occupants injured, one seriously, and drew tremendous news coverage and editorial attention. The next day, police commissioner Stephen P. Kennedy ordered what he called the "greatest manhunt in the history of the Police Department".

On December 24, a New York Public Library clerk using a phone booth dropped a coin. Looking up after he retrieved it, he saw a maroon-colored sock held to the underside of the shelf by a magnet. The sock contained an iron pipe with a threaded cap on each end. After consulting with other employees, he threw the device out a window into Bryant Park, bringing the bomb squad and more than 60 NYPD police officers and detectives to the scene.

In a letter to the New York Journal American the next month, Metesky said that the library bomb, as well as one discovered later the same week inside a seat at the Times Square Paramount, had been planted months before.

Throughout the investigation, the prevailing theory was that the bomber was a former Con Edison employee with a grudge against the company. Con Edison employment records were reviewed, but there were hundreds of other leads, tips, and crank letters to be followed up on. Detectives ranged far and wide, checking lawsuit records, mental hospital admissions, and vocational schools where bomb parts might be made. Citizens turned in neighbors who behaved oddly, and co-workers who seemed to know too much about bombs. A new group, the Bomb Investigation Unit, was formed to work on nothing but bomber leads. A warning circular picturing a homemade pipe bomb similar to the bomber's was distributed. Police distributed samples of the bomber's distinctive printing and asked anyone who might recognize it to notify them. A review of drivers' license applications in White Plains, the city favored by the bomber for posting his mail, found similarities in 500 of them to the bomber's printing; the names were forwarded to the NYPD for investigation.

Distractions

Throughout the search, simulated bombs and false bomb reports wasted police resources and frightened an already nervous public.

Around 1951 Frederick Eberhardt, 56 years old and, like Metesky, a former Con Edison employee with a grudge, sent a simulated pipe bomb filled with sugar to the company's personnel director at 4 Irving Place. Eberhardt was charged with sending threatening material through the mails. At his arraignment in November, an assistant district attorney told the judge, "This defendant is a particular source of annoyance to the New York City police. We are firmly convinced that he is not of sound mind. He has been sending simulated bombs around the city the past few months. Hundreds of police have been called out at all hours of the day and night to investigate because of his actions."

In October 1951, the main waiting room at Grand Central Terminal was emptied and 3,000 lockers were searched after a telephoned bomb warning. The search involved more than 35 NYPD personnel, and took three hours because 1,500 of the lockers were in use and only one master key was available. As each locker was opened, the head of the bomb squad palpated its contents, keeping a portable fluoroscope at the ready.

On December 29, 1956, at the height of false bomb reports from theaters, department stores, schools and offices, a note left in a phone booth at Grand Central Terminal reported that a bomb had been placed at the Empire State Building, requiring a search of all 102 floors of the landmark. A 63-year-old railroad worker picked up at Grand Central as a suspect died of a heart attack while being questioned at the East 35th Street station house. Later investigation eliminated him as a suspect.

Profile

Fingerprint experts, handwriting experts, the bomb investigation unit and other NYPD groups made little progress. With traditional police methods seemingly useless against Metesky's erratic bombing campaign, police captain John Cronin approached his friend James A. Brussel, a criminologist, psychiatrist and assistant commissioner of the New York State Commission for Mental Hygiene. Captain Cronin asked Brussel to meet with inspector Howard E. Finney, head of the NYPD's crime laboratory. Brussel examined the crime-scene photos and letters to develop an offender profile of the bomber. Brussel concluded that the bomber was suffering from paranoia, a condition that he described as "a chronic disorder of insidious development, characterized by persistent, unalterable, systematized, logically constructed delusions". Based on the evidence and his own experience dealing with psychotic criminals, Brussel offered a number of theories beyond the obvious grudge against Consolidated Edison:

Metesky's second letter provided some details about the materials used in the bombs (he favored pistol powder, as "shotgun powder has very little power"), promised a bombing "truce" until at least March 1, and wrote "I was injured on job at Consolidated Edison plant – as a result I am adjudged – totally and permanently disabled", indicating that he was forced to pay his own medical bills and that Consolidated Edison had blocked his workers' compensation case. He also wrote:

After police editing, the newspaper published his letter on January 15 and asked the bomber for "further details and dates" about his compensation case so that a new hearing could be held.

Metesky's third letter was received by the newspaper on Saturday, January 19. He complained of having laid unnoticed for hours on cold concrete after his injury without first aid, later leading to pneumonia and tuberculosis. The letter added details about his lost compensation case and the "perjury" of his coworkers, and provided the date of his injury, September 5, 1931. The letter suggested that he would have considered surrender to force the reopening of his compensation case if he did not have a family that would be "branded" by his identification. He thanked the Journal-American for publicizing his case and wrote that "the bombings will never be resumed". The letter was published Tuesday, the day after Metesky was arrested.

After Metesky's arrest, early police statements credited the discovery of his file to an NYPD detective. Later, a report developed in a reward investigation conceded that Kelly had found the file. Although the NYPD officially credited Kelly, she declined to claim the $26,000 in rewards, asserting that she had merely been doing her job. Consolidated Edison's board of directors also declined to file for the reward, prompting a group of shareholders to file as representatives of Kelly and the company.

Police investigators accused Con Edison of having impeded the investigation for almost two years by repeatedly informing them that employee records prior to 1940 had been destroyed. The police claimed that even after the employee records were located, Con Edison rejected police demands and formal requests, declaring that the papers were legal documents that could not be disclosed without the consent of its legal department. The company termed its lack of responsiveness to police requests a "misunderstanding". The detectives asked what "F.P." meant and he responded, "F.P. stands for Fair Play."

Metesky led them to the garage workshop, where they found his lathe. Hidden in the pantry of the house, the police found pipes and connectors suitable for bomb-making as well as three cheap pocket watches, flashlight batteries, brass terminal knobs and unmatched wool socks of the type used to transport the bombs.

Interrogation

Metesky told the arresting officers that he had been "gassed" in the Con Edison accident, had contracted tuberculosis as a result and started planting bombs because he "got a bum deal". Reviewing a police list of 32 bomb locations, but never saying the word "bomb", he remembered the exact date when each bomb had been placed and their sizes. He also added to the police list the size, date and location of 15 early bombs that the police had not discovered, all left at Con Edison locations.

In their search, police found parts for a bomb that would have been larger than any of the others. Metesky explained that it was intended for the New York Coliseum.

Commitment to Matteawan

thumb|Matteawan Hospital for the Criminally Insane

After hearing testimony from psychiatric experts, judge Samuel Liebowitz declared Metesky a paranoid schizophrenic, "hopeless and incurable both mentally and physically", and declared him legally insane and incompetent to stand trial. On April 18, 1957, Liebowitz committed Metesky to the Matteawan Hospital for the Criminally Insane in Beacon, New York.

Metesky was unresponsive to psychiatric therapy but was a model inmate and caused no trouble. He was visited regularly by his sisters and occasionally by Brussel, to whom he would emphasize that he had deliberately built his bombs not to kill anyone.

Doctors determined that he was harmless, and because he had already served two-thirds of the 25-year maximum sentence he would have received at trial, Metesky was released on December 13, 1973. The single condition was that he make regular visits to a Connecticut Department of Mental Hygiene clinic near his home.

Interviewed by a reporter upon his release, he said that he had forsworn violence, but reaffirmed his anger and resentment toward Consolidated Edison. He also stated that, before he began planting his bombs,

Metesky returned to his home in Waterbury, where he died 20 years later in 1994 at the age of 90.

References

Further reading

  • Cannell, Michael (2017). Incendiary: The Psychiatrist, The Mad Bomber and the Invention of Criminal Profiling. Minotaur Books. .
  • Greenburg, Michael M. (2011). The Mad Bomber of New York: The Extraordinary True Story of the Manhunt that Paralyzed a City. Union Square Press. .
  • Footage of the arrest of Metesky Newsreel February 11, 1957, Spanish Film Institute files. (video from 04:12, audio in Spanish)
  • Hearst Newsreel Footage Newsreel January 24, 1957, Hearst Newsreels from the UCLA Film & Television Archive.