L.O.G. 140 Handcuff Johnny

Hello and welcome to the video version of The Human Behavior Podcast. I'm Brian Marren, the host and creator of the show. As always, I will be joined by human behavior expert, Mr. Greg Williams, who the show is affectionately named after. On the show, we discuss different topics through the lenses of what we call Human Behavior Pattern Recognition Analysis. If you'd like to find out more about what that is, please check the links in the episode details and go to our website to learn more. Please don't forget to follow us on social media; the links are also in the episode details, and hit the like and subscribe button to help support our work. Thanks for tuning in, and we hope you enjoy the show.

That always killed me. It does, it does. Let's go ahead and get started this morning, Greg. First of all, good morning. We're recording this on Friday, so happy Friday, happy Friday to you. We're going to jump into a case that was brought to our attention by our consigliere, Sean, who you've known for a long time. I've known for a while as well. He passed along a story out of Michigan, and I'll just go ahead and kind of read some of the recap or details of the case so everyone gets caught up to speed.

This didn't really make national news, which we'll get into, but it was an interesting thing. Basically, a Michigan man accused of leaving threatening notes at telecommunications tower sites, placing bombs outside cell phone stores because he was upset about immoral content. This is all according to FBI and court filings. Seventy-five-year-old John Allen of Whittemore, Michigan, admitted to leaving letters and making bombs after authorities tracked him down and linked him to the crimes last week.

Letters were found in polka-dot envelopes inside plastic bags outside several telecom towers across the Upper Peninsula and Northern Michigan. I'm familiar with that area; my wife is originally from there, and you're definitely familiar with that area as well. The letters that he left demanded that telecommunication containing immoral content must be stopped, and that's including porn and cursing. The letter also demanded five million dollars payment within 180 days, so that's plenty of time to pay up, I guess. According to court filings, they were signed by "The Coalition for Moral Telecommunication," and this was an alleged group claimed to reach 27 states. That was all just information contained from the letter that this guy, John Allen, wrote.

This guy was seen on camera placing boxes outside of a Verizon store in Cheboygan and in Sault Ste. Marie, and an AT&T store. The boxes were found by employees in the morning of each of these stores. They contained pipe bombs and also had, made with nails, BBs, a bunch of stuff in there, and also handcuffs in the box, Greg. The boxes had "CMT" written on them, which is "The Coalition for Moral Telecommunication," and "Handcuff Johnny" was written on one box and "HJ" was written on the other. The boxes said it was a last warning, and the next time would be during business hours.

They tracked this guy using surveillance video, caught him crossing the Mackinac Bridge, everything like that. He told investigators that despite what the letter said, he was actually working alone, and there was no actual CMT group, according to court filings. He said he had purchased the supplies to make the bombs about a year ago and had to work up the courage to actually place them. He also confirmed that he was the person in surveillance photos, and according to investigators, "Handcuffed Johnny" was written because he believed he would end up in handcuffs for what he was doing. He was charged with extortion and attempted destruction of buildings.

Real quick, shout out to The Detroit News and Robert, who wrote this great article. I will put the link in the episode details if you're listening, because it was actually just in terms of a case of what happened, detailed everything, court documents, FBI said this, referenced, sourced all this stuff. It was just like a really, really good, well-informed article. When we just got sent this from Sean, I said, "Hey, let's do a podcast on it." I started looking this up just for more research, to see what other details popped up. This was a case that happened at the end of August, or excuse me, when this occurred was all around August 25th, August 26th, so basically about a month ago. I tried to see what else came of it, and there's really nothing. There are other details in the story that we can get into, but in terms of widespread reporting or anything else, there wasn't a lot out there.

Now, that could be for a number of reasons: one, what's in the news cycle, and that's just what else is going on takes precedence, could be because maybe it wasn't that big of a deal, or whatever happened. My first thing that I had sent to you is, "Hey, this pipe bomb letterbox attack is almost like an old-school thing now. It has 80s and 90s written all over it." My thing was too, if you really wanted to, because we see ransomware, malware attacks, or stuff like that on these major companies that pay sometimes, right? So they'll say, "Hey, we have all your data, or we blocked you out of this," that some hacker will do that, and they'll get money. Now they sometimes get caught if it's here in the U.S. too, but the idea is, this is a very, very different type of act.

A lot going on, the guy ended up saying, "Yeah, I did it. It was all me. There is no other group. I made all this stuff up, this, that, and the other thing." So he basically confessed to everything so far, or admitted to what they're trying to, admitted he was the one in the videos, admitted this is what he did. So, interesting from a number of perspectives, but that thing that first jumped out at me is, like I said, if this was 1993, CNN would have descended on this town of 400 people where this guy lived originally in Michigan and would have been interviewing people and going back and finding out what is going on, and is this part of a larger group? Michigan has its own past and history with different types of, like the Michigan Militia, different types of either white supremacist organizations or radical different groups that operate within there. So there's a history there. That's what also piqued my interest was that this wasn't really covered.

Also, this guy obviously very low-level sophistication, not much of an organization level either. He attempted a little bit, right? He did, he tried switching out some license plates on his vehicle and stuff, and little things, but really, not, I wouldn't say we found this guy that this wasn't like the next Tim McVeigh, you get what I'm saying? This was a different type. So that's a bit of a recap, and then I'll kind of throw to you, Greg, on where we want to start with the discussion of this.

Yeah, so I would say, first of all, thanks to the FBI. This was the easiest case they ever saw.

Yes.

Because they were chasing after Fess Parker, his flintlock, and a skin cap. The tactics that John Allen used were all straight out of CSI: Norfolk or Miami, or somewhere, whatever, shoot, or whatever. Right now they're probably, and you're exactly right when you're talking about the lowest level of organization, sophistication. We'll get that in a minute. My thing is that I'm glad he didn't go after us because he expressly hated the pornography and foul words.

Well, that's an interesting, that to use as your motive, your motivation for doing this, that's an interesting thing to go at, because.

Yeah, but that's what I want to, that's where I'd like to start. He goes after, he goes after big telecom, and he says, "Hey, this shall not stand," and by the way, "Handcuffed Johnny" means something totally different here in Michigan, if you know what I'm saying. So that's another one out here in California for sure too. But listen, so my motivation, and you know how much I hate motive and motivation, but this one's an important discussion point because, "I want to stop the transmission, transmission of pornography and foul words from big telecom, and I also want five million dollars." Where did that come from? You see what I'm trying to say? This is, this is an important decision too because you brought up.

So before you go any further, I just want to hit that real quick. Folks, listen, we always talk about determining someone's intent is far more important than their motive or what they did. That's used to explain to a jury why someone committed a crime. You don't necessarily need it, but it's not that it's unimportant, especially in an investigation. It may help you with figuring out what their target is or some part of that. We're getting a confession, like, "Hey, man, look, I get it. You hate that." So, it's not that it's unimportant, it's just not something we get into because we generally focus on intent.

Right, right. And so let's jump to that. Let's go, let's go to intent. So, first of all, for all of you Michigan fans, it's Whittemore (spelled W-H-I-T-T-E-M-O-R-E), it's like right here, and it may be pronounced Whittamore. We don't know, there's only 400 people to ask, and none of them have phones. But the idea is, one, he bought a license plate at a yard sale. Many people do that, Brian, many people do that. But then affixing it to his vehicle after he passed a certain control point, that demonstrates intent. He wanted to conceal his vehicle. Second, by using the license plate for half his trip, we knew where the nefarious activity was going on because from where he was in the middle of the Lower Peninsula, he would go out and plant the bombs, and then when he came back home, he would be back to the Michigan handicapped plate that he was using.

So he also bought materials at various stores a year ahead of time and used cash for those purchases. Important distinction, yes, because he didn't want to be traced. And think of the perseverance, think of the patience this man had to wait a year. Now he says he was trying to build up the courage. He's also trying (Greg gestures, holding up his hand) to distance himself from the potential attack location. Do you get where I'm going there?

So everyone's not clear, he's kind of like central-eastern sort of Michigan where these attacks occurred a couple hundred miles north, all the way up in the north and Upper Peninsula (U.P.). I'm sure he had to cross the Mackinac Bridge up into the U.P. which I just did not long before he did, actually, just before he was doing that, I was driving up there. So go ahead.

No, no, no. And the one thing I want to add to that, Brian, is that when you take a look at people say to me all the time, "How do you determine intent?" Well, I want to give a quick class on how to determine intent right now. Did John Allen – Handy J, did John Allen (that's close, that's an abbreviation) – did John Allen intend to kill somebody? Clearly not at this point. Why? Because he didn't kill anybody. You see, that's the easy part about the difference between motivation. I, Brian, I'm motivated to scream and kill and do all these other things, but I don't take any significant steps towards that goal.

You've said that.

Yeah, but he actually did. He made bombs, he bought components, and he placed them. Now, where did he emplace them, and when? Yes, and placed them at the place that he said he had the problem with. But temporally, he put them there when there were no people there, right? Clearly stating to me that he never intended to kill anybody, and this is a simple extortion. Now he may not like pornography, he may not like harsh words. He's pissed at something. But when you then say, "Oh, by the way, I need five million dollars," and now the clock is ticking, that's ridiculous. That's all intent.

You're right. And I would agree with you, he never intended to actually harm anyone. I don't know if he was trying to get his message out, because like you said, it's confusing because he's saying, "Hey, I'm doing it because I don't like your immoral behavior." Okay, but then I also want money, which is also, I'm extorting you, which is immoral behavior, right? It's a confusing message, so he's not even clear. To even go with what you said about the intent, he was charged with extortion and attempted destruction of buildings, so he was not charged with murder or anything like that, right? It was clear that this was about, but although they were real explosive devices, though.

Now, add to what you're saying there too, Brian. The FBI shows up at his doorstep, and his wife looks at the photos, and I can see his lovely wife sitting there, and she goes, "I'm 95% sure that's my husband." Okay, so first of all, this is not a criminal cabal. This isn't a terrorist group. And then when they confront Johnny, Johnny goes, "Yeah, that was me. Yeah, I did this. Yeah, the rest of the stuff's in the garage." Okay, there really is no group, it's just me. We're not saying what he did is right, and we're not saying anybody should attempt this because it's horrifically dangerous, and it puts the onus on himself and his wife and his neighbors, right? But the idea is that we're not talking about a career criminal, Brian. We're talking about a retired minor, frustrated from COVID, a lot of time on his hands. Do you get what I'm trying to say? And going, "My dear wife and I, five million. Can you imagine what we could do with five million dollars?" And who's got the deep pockets, Brian? Nobody kidnaps you and I, and we travel all over the world. You know why? Because we have this Walmart jacket. I got my new yellow T-shirt on. I mean, what would they take from us, Brian? But here, John, he wanted, let's again, most people want their say, not their way. John started slipping into, "I want my way," and he fell short. He failed miserably. That's important to understand.

Well, that, and this is the interesting thing is, why did, what, what is going on here? Why did he actually do this? What was the point of him doing all this? Is that because that's the interesting thing. It's like, okay, you weren't really clear on what your message is. You're kind of this bumbling guy trying to do something. Like, what the hell is going on here? And I think it just shows the level of planning he did not put into this. Because do you think he really had a plan, how is he going to get that money? Like, who, how were they supposed to contact him? How would different?

Well, that's the thing. This is out of a movie from the 90s. I think this is not even from a real caper that we've seen. It is a caper. That's the greatest use of this word. This is a caper, why? Because capers go wildly wrong. I mean, this, this is, first of all, he's got the family truckster. He's got his little minivan. Yeah, and he's got his handicapped plate on it. He walks with a limp. Listen, folks, we talk about these nuanced things that you should pay attention to that will help you identify people later on, because one of the things you should be as a good witness, this guy gave you everything. Query party.

And even to that, Greg, some of the reporting on here was that one of the boxes outside of one of these places was wrapped in black electrical tape and had wires sticking out.

Yep. So.

Well, wait a minute. From human behavior, what does that tell you?

Exactly, exactly. Yeah, you're right on here. Let me tell you, everybody. Did you remember what Brian said at the beginning of the episode about the envelopes? The envelopes were bright, polka dot, pink and blue, and happy. Okay, what does that tell you about John Allen's intent? He wanted to be nice. He wanted his message to be seen. He was not trying to hide. He was not trying to disguise his voice through an electronic transmitter.

But that's what I'm saying, is he wanted someone to see it. So yeah, with wires sticking out, you're kind of going like, "Stay awake, dummy." If you have the acumen to build a pipe bomb, which is not difficult to do, you have the acumen to keep the entire bomb inside of the box, right? I mean, so, all right, so why would there ever be a wire sticking out?

You get what? Why exactly?

Because he wanted some, I don't think he ever wanted some employee working at an AT&T (or some kid riding a bike, or that's what it would be, some young high school kid or something like that, or 19 years old, just out of high school, and you've got your job at the AT&T store selling cell phone cases and all their cell phone plans) and you show up, and I don't think he wanted to kill that person. So I had to make this obvious to find, right? So he wanted it to be found.

No, no, you're exactly right. So for those that are listening or watching along with us that are longtime listeners, and those of you that are brand new, bring out the yellow pad. So on the top of the yellow pad, put "Access." And then the second thing you want to write is "Sophistication." And then the third thing you want to write is "Organization." So people are saying, "Well, listen, I don't understand access." You either have to have access to wreak havoc, or you have to make access. So nobody's going to listen to John Allen. So he builds a bomb, whether it's going to go off or not, in a box that you're going to see with a scary note, and he leaves it somewhere. Now he immediately has access to the FBI. He immediately has access to the news media. He immediately has access to Verizon and AT&T. You get what I'm saying? He couldn't, he couldn't call and get a meeting with those folks. But during this, using this method, he was able to gain access. So don't think access means climbing through a window. Access means getting close, bringing you to the crime scene, bringing the bullet to you. Those types of things mean access.

Sophistication: a pipe bomb is a low level of sophistication. Yes, it's not very highly sophisticated. The notes that are used aren't highly sophisticated. Waiting a year, buying with cash instead of a credit card, Brian, those all exhibit low sophistication. Now high organization would have been to make sure that you didn't buy the gosh darn California plate.

Yeah.

It was not only outdated by five years or more at a yard sale in your own community. Do you get what I'm trying to say?

Right.

That just demonstrates that he wasn't the master criminal, the, the, the emblem on the back from the car dealership where he got it. Those types of things that shows a low level of organization.

Even exactly, even with what he said and what he offered and how he carried this out, right? You're not talking about like you said, this is some well-coordinated, highly organized event. It's not, it's just the bumbling goofball from.

It doesn't mean he's not dangerous either, buddy. That doesn't mean he's not, not.

Absolutely. If he killed a bunch, this would have gone completely differently. Yeah, if that thing exploded and then killed someone, or even just blown up and not even killed someone or hurt someone, but still it would have been much different. It would have been a much different case. And so then obviously it would have been probably all of the news, and there would have been the manhunt, and that we would have been found even quicker. I mean, they had him fairly quickly.

Very quickly. And again, because he was walking around with coonskin cap and a flintlock, you know what I'm trying to say?

And then that, that goes into then obviously when something like this occurs, you get certain resources allocated. It goes right to FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force. This is what these organizations are created for after 9/11, right? Okay, this is going on, we now have the best resources in the country available at our fingertips. Boom, let's go do this, which they ended up having to do a little bit of surveillance on the guy in this small town, which I don't know how they pulled that off, but if you were somehow involved in this case and would love to explain to me how you were able to get into a town of only 400 people and pull surveillance without getting noticed, I don't know. So would I be good at your job?

No, no, I heard the FBI went to those people that delivered the Publisher's Clearing House and asked them, "How do you guys keep hidden?" Because, Brian, you're bringing up such an incredible point. Not only did they change the entire atmosphere to the bill, but remember, they had to bring in the bomb truck and conceal it some place. They had the raid truck, they had the ram, they had all of these air assets, you know, somewhere.

Exactly.

No, no, you're exactly right. And I want you to thank for a couple of things that are important about, that's hilarious, by the way. One, this guy is going up against Mullah Omar's best. This guy's going up against Muhammad's best. You don't have a chance, folks, don't try it because they're in. You don't think so? And John Allen used old-school methodology. He knew there would be a camera, so he changed the plate. He knew there would be surveillance, so he made sure he distanced the locations from his home because he didn't want to be tracked. Who does that sound like? Immediately when I read this, I'm thinking Dennis Rader, BTK. Dennis Rader was shipping out on discs that he bought at a store, his threats and pieces of photographs of pieces of the decedents and scenes where buying, torture, kill, that he did horrible stuff, not understanding that technology had advanced so much that the church computer that he was using and his emails and the disc that he was sent, everything was tracked. So the detective contacts Rader, and Rader says, "Hey, could we continue doing this, and like you pretend like you don't know who it is?" Because Rader gets off on that anonymity and the surprise and the secrecy without getting away with it.

So Allen isn't tuned into that. Allen is going, "I fancy myself a Double-O-Seven," but he's more like a "Zero." Do you hear what I'm trying to say?

Yeah.

And he just, he just doesn't think that technology has caught up with these insurgents.

And that goes into the organization level, and you can see what someone's organization level, what their even, I guess, level of intellect, level of comfort and adaptability, because look at where he went, right? So he knew like, "Okay, well I can't do it right outside of my town or nearby. Like, I'm not just going to drive over to Detroit. Hey, I better get the heck out of here." Well, he's only going to go as far as he's comfortable going. He never left the state of Michigan, he never left his own, and he never went towards Flint or Detroit or Lansing, big places where he might get shot, or he's less comfortable. He's from a small town, so we're going to stick to all small towns, so he totally is targeting on his familiarity. Right? He only went as far.

And we've, we've had this, I know, we kind of referred to it as like the rectangle theory before, but if you look at that, I'll compare what he did and then to two murderers. One, Ted Bundy. So Ted Bundy went from literally the top left-hand corner of the United States, northwest, all the way down to Florida at the very, very, very lower right-hand tip. So that was his box to play in. That's where he felt comfortable. He was smart and he was a total psychopath, right? But he could manipulate people really well. He was an intelligent guy, and so he had this freedom of movement to move across the entire country. He felt comfortable enough to go across the entire country. He felt comfortable to escape from jail and then come back when he was out of food and it was freezing cold. You know what I'm saying? Like this guy could maneuver that way.

But compare that to, remember the, if anyone's seen the Netflix documentary series from a few years ago, the Steven Avery case in Wisconsin.

Yeah, still in jail, right?

Yeah, exactly. What a surprise. So what happened there is, he had met this woman, Teresa Halbach, I think was her name. She showed up to his property, and you could literally take the top left-hand corner of his property where his home was, where he lived was, where they met. She was coming out to do this photo shoot job for one of his cars he was selling. And then they found her body where, and literally in the lower right-hand corner of his lot, of his land, of his salvage yard. So his area that he was comfortable operating in did not extend past the property lines of where he lived. So that's what we're talking about when we get into organization, when we talk about how, where you look for, from all humans, look for familiarity, especially in situations like this that are high-stress-level situations, you're going to stick to what you know.

Ted Bundy goes, "Hey, man, I've got the ability to maneuver all over this country. I'm totally fine doing that, and I have the ability to do that." Steven Avery said, "You know what? I am not comfortable outside of my property."

Yeah, that's brilliant.

And this guy, John Allen, the same thing with these bombs, like, "Well, I'll go all over the state of Michigan, but I'm not going to go anywhere else outside of that."

I would say this, Brian, and I got to be absolutely honest with you, I have no idea where he planted all those bombs. His intent was clear. I got a couple of key factors out of it I'd like to talk about. But I would tell everybody that's at home, if they show the locations of those towns, what I would do is I would put Whittemore on my little map. Then I would put all the locations that he did the bombs, and I'll guarantee you, sight unseen, that the bridge (Mackinac Bridge) is the exact halfway point to all the locations. Why? Because the bridge offered him insulation from the Lower Peninsula (to the) Upper Peninsula. I'll also tell you that my prediction would be that his first or his last is either going to be the closest or the furthest because he has to go through a testing phase first, "I learned my boundaries." Do you get what I'm trying to say? So for those of you that are routine listeners, you'll know what I'm talking about. So immediately when I start seeing that, Brian, your instinct is going to say, "Draw a box of all the locations and say the center of that location is where the bomber is." Now, the center of that location is significant, but look what it means, but there's a geographical significance there. It's a barrier.

Yeah, I know that. And that, that's a good point, and you'll see that with that type of behavior. You will. You'll either go, "Okay, I'll test my boundaries a little bit, I'll get a little bit farther on my comfort zone. And if I'm successful, okay, then I'll get a lot farther. Okay, then I'll go even farther, then I'll go even farther." Or like you just said, the opposite will occur, "Okay, I'm going to get the hell away from here. Okay, here's a good spot. You know what? I'm going to, I'm going to victimize someone again." You know, "I'm getting better at this, and I'm getting lazier at this, and I don't want to go as far from where I live now." So now it'll end up being even closer to where that person lives.

Yeah. And Brian, think of this, the level of organization and sophistication that we talk about for a guy like Ted Bundy, a guy like John Wayne Gacy, a serial predator like Dennis Rader, when you take a look at the capers, and there's thousands of TV shows about crime scenes, whenever it's little Sally that got knocked off her bike and victimized and murdered, it's always somebody that's two houses away or a house away or in the backyard or something like that, and they get caught right away. Why? Because they're stupid. They get the happy head, they don't think things out. Allen thought things out, but he didn't think things out well enough. Now, Allen was looking at the forest and saying, "That's my tree." These people that we chase for a long time, what they do is they don't trip up. They don't make these mistakes. They've got the patience of a saint, Brian, and they understand evidence, they understand artifacts that can be used against them later, and so they're evidence-aware, which helps us find them because they are so sophisticated, they're so organized.

Yeah, they say they usually just, it's that high level of organization. And what I'm saying there too, sophistication.

Yeah, because they, because they venture out of their low sophistication comfort zone by repeating a behavior, do you get what I'm trying to say? And it's not picked up by their organization. They'll slip up, they'll repeat something, and they'll go, "Gosh darn it!" Like, you think it's cool to have a moniker, "Handcuff Johnny," because what was he thinking, "Well, I'm not very good at this, and yeah, I'm going to get arrested"? Also, he had a numbered system, I remember Sean sending me, and the last two letters were the old company that he had worked for something, so.

Okay. Why do people do that?

Exactly. So you're talking to somebody in the moment, and you ask them, "So what's your date of birth?" And they give you a date of birth. And then you say, "Okay, and how old does that make you?" And they go, "But," because they haven't thought it out that far. Do you see what I'm saying? Those type of slip-ups here cost John Allen his freedom.

No, and that, that's a, that's a good point, which again, speaks to how much thought he put into this and how much thought all humans put into anything that we do. I think what it was, was he had used, it was something on the numbering system, the last company he worked for, it was like "TG," and then he put "TG" and this number, and it was just because that's what he could think of at the time. I mean, there's like.

So you're exactly right. So let's go to that point and let's talk again about the sophistication organization because I don't want to confuse people. Low levels of sophistication, high levels of organization, you'll never get caught, you'll almost never get caught. Not go too far, yeah. But if you play with those and you accidentally slip up, which we're humans, we make mistakes, you're going to get caught. So everybody out there, if you're thinking you're going to be the smartest criminal in the world, all you do is set yourself up for failure because the smarter you are, the more signature moves you leave.

Now, I'll give you an example. He got busted because the name of the car dealership where he bought a flipping car is right next to the license plate that he took so long to switch. Now, we know grey men, we know people that do that grey man theory. And I'll tell you that guy is going to tell you, "Well, take that distinctive name of the dealership off." Okay, what kind of scrub your vehicle doesn't have one? Scrub your vehicle, all identifying things. Which means it sticks out. Immediately sticks out, you stick out more than everyone else because of that.

Do you ever see the 70s, Taxi Driver with De Niro? Okay, the idea is that Scorsese smoked so much Gange while they were making that film, and he's blowing it to De Niro, who I have no faith or respect for, but when they make the movie, they're showing tells. They're showing signature moves throughout the movie. So if you conducted predictive analysis and weren't high by the midpoint of the movie, you were already ready to walk out. You knew exactly what's going to happen and the order it was going to happen. I bet you if we got an FBI agent on the phone about this case, he would say this is the same thing, they were just waiting for that next move because John Allen wasn't organized enough to predict what the next move is going to be. Look, you can't just play offense in football, you have to determine what the defense is likely going to do, right? Isn't that the strategy? It's a game of inches, and here this cat and mouse game was over almost immediately.

Yes. He didn't consider all those loopholes, Brian. No, he didn't. And thankfully, we're kind of like, we're sort of making light of all these things to demonstrate how we articulate some of this stuff, right? How to determine that most likely, most dangerous course of action, what someone's intent is, how serious.

Yeah, but we don't, I'm not, we're not making light that this could have been horribly catastrophic. Nobody should attempt it. Nobody should try this. Not a good way of extortion. I don't think we're coming.

Well, there's no good way of extortion, right?

No, no, but what I'm trying to say is that we're probably in Ionia, they're probably broadcasting our podcast in the prison system. Somebody's trying to go, "Oh, next time I won't make the mistake that John Allen did." Yes, you will. Everybody makes those mistakes. You know why, Brian? Because we're human, and we have stress fractures, and we have, we've got to poop, everybody poops. We've got to stop on the side of the road and get fuel. How many end caps and six or eight inches threaded pipe do people buy? I have the worst luck with plumbing in the history of human plumbing, and I've still never bought an end cap for a pipe like that. We did when we were making faux bombs, fake bombs, to be discovered. But then again, Brian, I mean, we were discovered almost immediately and had to explain what we were doing. So it's not, and don't think that you're going to be fun or clever. One, you're going to get somebody hurt, or you're going to get hurt yourself, or it's going to be divulged on a search, or there's so many things wrong with this. And look, they added that the guy was a minor because they wanted to put into the suggestion of your readers that, "Listen, the guy was familiar with explosives." Mining industry doesn't use pipe bombs. They're not sitting up there building that stuff either. You use certain types of explosive charges that are pre-built, and then you can, like that's a very, very different type of demolition type work than a bomb.

Completely different. But I see what you're getting at here. There's some of the takeaways. One, good on the employees at some of these places that saw something and was like, "Hey, what the heck is this? This looks odd." It's just another reminder that even when you have some person like this who's just trying to send a message, it's incredibly dangerous and people could die. So you're looking out for those things, I mean, is a big deal, right? We always say to do that, but anything out of the ordinary, especially at a business something like that, which goes into targeting in general, and what exactly what the average person doesn't really think about, right? So I would go to the AT&T or Verizon employee, I don't know which one found a package, showing up to work. Okay, you're working at one of those companies, you don't picture yourself as a potential target of a terrorist or criminal act. Like you just don't, you just think like, "What? I work, this is my job. I work here." But that's much different than working at the bakery down the street or the grocery store, right? Meaning that they're all different types of locations.

And that goes back to the Nashville bombing last Christmas, because it's considered critical infrastructure. Now, none of these buildings were critical infrastructure, although he was trying this at cell phone towers, right? And those have their own set of security protocols, but also if you took out a cell phone tower, there's redundant systems where other towers it might bother someone's service for a little while, but probably not that big of a deal unless it was something major and catastrophic. But the ones that would be major and catastrophic typically have more security at them, although the one in Nashville was very much exposed last Christmas because it didn't with that bombing down there. So it goes into how we look at what we, because when do I raise my level of awareness? What do I need to think about? When do these situations go? Well, that's one of those that we don't ever think about. It's like being at the post office. That's what you don't ever think of. I'm just going to send my mail, pick up some stamps, do whatever. But we determined it happened so much, we had a term for it in the United States of "going postal" and having workplace violence stuff. So that's another thing to look at.

I put it from the perspective of just the person showing up to work who's got 17 other things going on. And how many, how many people wouldn't even have noticed it, would have picked that package up and brought it inside and thrown it in their boss's desk, or wherever the mail is, to get it out of the way when they were unlocking the door and perhaps detonating.

Right.

And I, I think that's, that's an important point to bring up in these too, is if you're, if you're that person working at it, you know that that's, you're that sort of first line of defense, right? So that's the other part I want to hit about the story. And then the other thing was too, is if you are going to extort one of these companies, you look at what's happening now that I brought up earlier, the ransomware attacks, a malware attack, some sort of hacking thing too. So this guy obviously did not have the ability to conduct any type of attack like that, so he stuck with what he knows. And which is interesting that I immediately thought of it as like, "This is an old-school thing." Is this less likely to happen in 2021 than it was in 1991? And not really, it's still just as easy now to make a pipe bomb than it is as it was 30 years ago. It's just a little bit more difficult to get away with it over time now because of communication and surveillance and cameras and all that stuff. So it's a little bit different. It's interesting to see how those things change over time to where this guy has a grievance, but does he really, is he trying to get money? He's got, like, it just none of his story really made sense. Because typically someone who's going to go through the process of building and constructing an explosive device to set it somewhere for the purposes of either to kill someone or to extort money, they typically have more of an intense, they typically have some sort of plan in mind or that they're going to enable whatever the cause is, whatever the motivation is, whether they want to get money or it's for some group that they have that they want to conduct an attack on someone. There's usually a greater amount of planning involved or some type of specific intent or motivation where this guy was kind of a bit all over the place, I guess.

Yeah, yeah. So, so let me discourage anybody from thinking how these things might spin. What's the kid's, what's the kid's name, the actor that was in Ted, that owned it, the bear? Yeah, Ted was the bear, but Mark Wahlberg. Now, Wahlberg was a sniper in a film about shooting the president. Do you remember that film?

Yeah.

But somebody listening or watching is going to go, "Oh, I really enjoyed that film." Okay, so he creates the chest suction tube, then gives himself combat first aid and has a very specific every single thing in that movie. Two movies: rent that one tonight and rent Dirty Work, because both of those will show you how the lack of detailed planning are going to find you out. Because we all have signature moves, we do them every day. That's why Human Behavior Pattern Recognition is on one side of the coin and the analysis on the other. That's how you will be found out, so you might as well not do it.

So what can we learn from an event like this? Well, first of all, have a protocol, have a bomb threat checklist by your phone. Even in a small business, what would you do if you saw those things that you couldn't explain outside? "Hey, I think I saw counter-surveillance or surveillance today." "Hey, I think somebody dropped a package in our dumpster." Now, it might be in the dumpster, it might be a body. How many people body dump close to where they accidentally, or in a rage, killed somebody? How many people try to dump evidence that way? I mean, look at Dorner in California, how many times did he go to the dumpster and he was caught on the camera because he was trying to not leave a trail of evidence. So these folks that would do you harm are going to screw up if you pay attention. Just lifting, raising your level of attention in your daily life is going to make it hard for them. And remember what's the first thing I asked you to write down, is "access." You deny them access, they can't get you. You deny them access, they can't get your family. Brian, it's so simple, and we keep banging that drum, but there's still people that miss out, buddy.

No, and again, those are, these are all good, good takeaways on this case too, to remember. This also, this is one of those, we only hear about the bad ones, and we only hear about something catastrophic, and we only hear all the things that we missed. And this is kind of one where the way we've set up our system of responding to these events when they happen has gotten way better. And this kind of shows how quickly they were on this guy, had him, were able to surveil him, to pick him up, and everything. I mean, very, very, very quickly. Which is, which is a win, so we, like Shelly always says, "Celebrate the small wins." Right? This is one of those.

It absolutely is.

And we're so used to talking about a lot of the catastrophic ones that it's important to highlight all of the things that went right with this in terms of an investigation and then now probably subsequent prosecution. It doesn't seem like there's going to be much if this guy's admitted everything, but which makes it, which makes it easier. So I know, what else do we have?

Well, I want to add this to you. So we always talk about Isla Vista, we talk about our troubled youth that had the Starbucks on a dashboard. Elliot Rodger, while he was giving his manifesto before he went out to kill, he had killed before, and now he's going to go out and kill again. I would tell everybody that it should shock you to your core that a 75-year-old guy in a granny van named John Allen was driving next to you on the freeway with a pipe bomb, an explosive device that literally made his vehicle classified as a vehicle-borne improvised explosive device, Brian, and we had to deal with those a lot, and it's horrible. And you never knew it. He pulled next to you in the 7-Eleven to get gas, and he pulled up to grab a gallon of milk before he went back to Whittemore. He was building them in a small town surrounded by people that went to the yard sale at their house a day or two before. You never know, Brian, and because you never know, you have to be, you can't be hyper-alert, you have to be able to maintain it, but you should be alert enough to say, "Wow, this isn't like John Allen. Wow, that's unusual that that vehicle is pulled up in an angle at a closed business and a guy is walking over a box wearing a mask." Well, people are going to go, "Yeah, but yeah, okay, but who makes a delivery to an AT&T store?"

Well, and that's exactly it. Who makes deliveries? Well, the post office, Amazon, UPS. You can name them all. And you know what a delivery driver looks like when he's delivering a package. He or she is in a hurry to get all of those things done because they have an entire truck very full of other packages. They don't often do it when a business is closed. They don't, they just don't, right?

Right.

It's going to be typically during normal business hours. No, that's it. And that, that's a good point, and those are the little things to do, because how often do we go unseen, especially with as much as our entire economy is run on, I get online, I click something, and it gets shipped to me sometimes in the same day or next day. I mean, we're so used to seeing that kind of stuff that it's easy to kind of blend in. But like you just said, I mean, it's a minivan with a 75-year-old man, and it's not during right now. Okay, those three indicators right there, Greg, that I can go, "This one is different than anything else I've seen, and that's what I've seen this month, this year, this week." And it's those just very, very simplistic observations of what's a, what's a deviation from normal? What's a deviation from the baseline that you can judge everything off of, right? Just stick with what you know personally and what you've seen before and the experiences that you've had to go, "Hey, this one is different. Here's why it's different. I should do something about that." Is obviously the next step is, what is your role? Can you call the police and say, "Hey, this is a suspicious package was delivered here, and this is why." Yeah, absolutely, you can. All right, you've, you've done your job. And that's the whole point is they'd rather go there and it be nothing than have it, "Well, let's don't worry about calling that in. It's not a big deal," and then that's the one that blows up the building or something.

So exactly right. That, that's a good way to look at it. And that's the Elliot Rodger one, like he brought up from Isla Vista. Like you said, the scariest thing in his manifesto that he recorded and put on YouTube is that he had that cup of Starbucks coffee, which means he was standing in line next to someone 10 minutes prior to recording that video, and 30 minutes prior to killing a bunch of people.

Cho at Virginia Tech in the lobby of the post office before he goes on his killing spree.

Yeah, these people are within and amongst a law-abiding society, Brian, you have to pay attention. And I would add something, Brian. I would say, you just had a great thumbs-up message from one of our viewers and they said, "Now they're more aware," and they said, "Hey, listen, I've researched what things in my environment will stop a nine millimeter." Well, I would say this too, I can guarantee you, sight unseen again, that the FBI, Homeland Security, a bunch of other companies online, will have blast radius information. And if you think you see a suspicious vehicle, bicycle, package, all you got to do is go to their website first of all, now, not when it happens, right? And take a look and see about how big of a radius that you have to evacuate your personnel, evacuate folks while somebody's on with 9-1-1. Turn off radios and stuff. They can do it. There's a simple checklist for it. You don't, Brian, just like CPR is a simple thing, there's steps. Heimlich, steps. Well, you can educate yourself now and just have one of those flyers. They'll send you free. I'll guarantee it's laminated and wonderful because the government pays for all of that stuff. And you can have one at your desk at work. When in case of an emergency, you can whip it out and you can do the right thing. You don't have to be scared all the time, you just have to be alert.

Yeah. So, the next thing is too, is spotting someone like this before they're doing it, or someone we know who's thinking about doing something like this. I mean, you're seeing right now just big picture a lot more of this kind of violent outbursts, shootings, stuff like this, because once again, we're kind of all of the things that humans typically do to blow off steam or to get out and do things, whether that's going to the restaurant or a bar or a show or a concert or a trip. Like, that's been taken away from us as a society for a year and a half. So it's, it's kind of a weight on us, our mental health more than most people realize, which is why you start to see these stress fractures of the shooting at the baby shower, or the kid's birthday, or the crowd. All this stuff. So this is, I look at it as another one of those things, because as those happen more frequently, they become almost, not that it becomes normalized, it becomes easier for the next person to then go have that same reaction, right? So the more I see that stuff, the more it becomes normal. And now my, my, what would internally, maybe at some point this guy was going like, "Hey, this seems a little crazy to start building bombs and putting them in places. This is a big deal." Well, the more you see it, the more you see it, the more you see this, it's like, "Well, then I would be just if I can internally justify that to myself what I'm doing because, well, I'm seeing it all the time. Everyone else is doing it. People are shooting each other. At least I have a message here I'm trying to send, or at least this." So it's one of those things why it gets so concerning when you see all that stuff happening on the news because it always leads to the next one. Right? It always, it allows that next person to again just rationalize their own beliefs and what they're doing. So that's why those things always concern me the most.

I would add this, Brian. When you use the metaphor, you said that we like to let off steam. So having a tremendous amount of experience in HVAC (Heating, Ventilation, and Air Conditioning), I know that hot water heat is the most efficient heating in the world, and steam, if steam does not have an outlet, it's going to build up, and a steam explosion is a huge explosion. It's very big. It's going to scald and kill and do a tremendous amount of damage. So even the metaphor is based on the fact that when you said that, "If we don't blow off steam," the next unsaid sentence is, "that it's going to explode, it's going to come out somewhere." Yeah. And so the government has to understand that a check will only go so far, and empathy logically has an end point, psychologically. Do you get what I'm trying to say? Logically and psychologically. So folks, if you feel like you know of someone, or you yourself is getting to that point, and you can no longer let off the steam on your own, you've got to speak out, you've got to get help. And John Allen probably was in a closed system, I don't know that, where he, you know what I'm saying, he didn't have that out.

And that's all the initial reporting, the same thing. "Oh, he was kind of the, people kind of knew who he was, but didn't get involved much. Was quiet." You know that kind of thing. There was nothing really. So, you know, it's if you, and you've got to think about that is, think about everyone you know or run into in your life and what would be the description of that person if someone, a news reporter, came up and said, "Hey, what do you think about what so and so did?" Start thinking about that now, I think, because now you start to identify what that person is, kind of a little bit reclusive or off to themselves or they're not getting involved with this. And like we always say, if you or someone you know is writing a manifesto, you've got it, man. Airing your grievances like that, you're heading down a really, really tough, bad path, right? A manifesto is a substantial step. So a lot of people at work will sit around and go, "I hate the government. That damn guy, whoever's sitting behind the president's chair, I want to punch him, I want to kill him." And nobody ever takes a significant step. That's blowing off steam.

Yeah. The idea is, now if you decide to drive from wherever you are to D.C., okay, that's a substantial step, a significant step towards that demonstrates intent towards doing something. You've got to get on the phone, you just got it.

Right. And that, that demonstrating intent is important. The other thing is, if I take the time, this goes, if I take the time to write down what that is, and I do bullet points, "Here's my grievances, here's..." like, it's obviously very, very important to me now. Now, this is why we always say it doesn't have to be important to you, but you have to pay attention to those signals. Meaning, if I, just like anything, if I take the time to write graffiti on a wall, it's important. Now maybe it's a stupid, funny message in a bathroom, or it's a gang tag on a billboard over a highway overpass, but I took the time to do that, so it's important. I literally, whatever I take the time to do is important to me, right? What I would occupy my time with. So I did that, so it's important to pay attention to what those messages are because that's very different than just tweeting out the first thing that pops into my head, right?

So look at the psychological profile you just built for John Whittemore, John Whittemore, or John Allen Whittemore. He spent a year amassing the stuff to do his job. He bought a license plate at a yard sale while you were walking around the yard sale saying, "Wow, you don't see many ashtrays now," again. Okay, he was next to you going, "That California plate would be perfect for my subscribe." That's what you've got to think about. You've got to think about that when you're driving across the bridge. He's driving across the bridge thinking, "Hey, there's a camera, how can I defeat the camera so my vehicle can't be traced?" Do you get what I'm saying? That's important to me, is that he is thinking inward, down, and in on his plan while you're just driving to get.

No, he had to swap that license plate out somewhere.

Yeah, and what, what reason, what did anyone ever have to ever swap out a license plate?

Yep, yep. So I mean, someone, someone probably saw it. He did it in a gas station or a parking lot somewhere. Do you know what I'm saying? Like it's little stuff like that that always, always stands out.

So, well, I think that's a pretty good wrap on that case. I know we got into another example of how we get into organization, sophistication, access. All good, good takeaways. Our rectangle theory kind of came up again. But it goes into just the behavior behind all of this stuff and what someone's intent is versus their motive. Because this, just how we break those down using those lenses, I thought this was a good case for that. So anything, anything else to add today as we wrap this up, Greg?

Thanks, Uncle Sean.

Oh, yeah, thanks, Sean, for sending this. And also, anyone listening, please check out the episode details. We've got a bunch of links and stuff in there you can check out, not just the link to this article, but some other training stuff we have going on. Also, follow us on Instagram there too on The Human Behavior Podcast, and then of course the Arcadia side of it as well, our Arcadia Cognorati. So you can again stay connected to everything we have going on, and we post other stuff about these cases and what we do. So if you do that, you can check that out. And we have the Patreon site where we're adding stuff weekly, extras from the episode, and as well as some of the other stuff we do on the Arcadia Cognitive side with work, we'll send that out to our Patreon subscribers on here first to kind of take a look at it and comment on. So we appreciate it on there. And as always, don't forget that training changes behavior.