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Georgia Man Indicted for Bomb Threat against IRS Office in New York

September 30, 2020

Georgia Man Indicted for Bomb Threat against IRS Office in New York

On August 5, 2020, in the Southern District of Georgia, Benjamin Stasko was indicted for making a willful threat to kill using an explosive and the interstate transmission of a threat to injure. These charges stemmed from a July 2020 threat Stasko made to bomb an Internal Revenue Service (IRS) office located in New York, New York.According to the court documents, on July 6, 2020, Stasko posted on a public website a bomb threat. The post claimed that a “highly explosive pipe bomb,” intended for the IRS, was placed inside the Federal building located at 290 Broadway, New York, New York. Law enforcement officers and bomb-sniffing canines responded to the Federal building, but did not locate an explosive device. Subsequent investigative efforts by TIGTA special agents identified Stasko as the person responsible for posting the threat. These efforts also revealed that Stasko had items at his residence believed to be the beginnings of a pipe bomb, along with notes explaining how he would blow up the IRS building.If convicted of the indicted offenses, Stasko faces fines for each offense and up to 10 years’ imprisonment.

Source:  The facts in this case narrative come from the following publicly available documents: S.D. Ga., Crim. Comp., filed Jul. 13, 2020, and S.D. Ga., Indict., filed Aug. 5, 2020.