Amarillo man pleads guilty for attempting to use a weapon of mass destruction
AMARILLO, Texas (CBSDFW.COM) – A man from Amarillo has pleaded guilty to a weapons of mass destruction charge.
Erfan Salmanzadeh, 33, set off a bomb in his backyard, stashed a suicide vest in his alleyway and plotted to blow up a local high school.
He is facing up to life in federal prison.
Salmanzadeh, a naturalized U.S. citizen born in Iran, admitted to law enforcement that he had used homemade triacetone triperoxide (TATP) to blow up an Xbox in his backyard on July 26, 2021, according to plea papers. At the time, he claimed he wanted to see how much damage such an explosion would cause.
Bomb technicians collected residual TATP – an extremely unstable explosive that reacts violently to friction and shock – from Salmanzadeh's toilet bowl.
They also discovered TATP residue on a white PVC pipe hidden in his bedroom closet. A suicide vest was uncovered, which contained several sewn pockets filled with red cylindrical taped tubes labeled "dynamite," and nail bomb from the dumpster.
He admitted that he flushed a gallon-sized jar of TATP powder down the toilet and concealed a suicide vest and a nail bomb in a dumpster in his alleyway.
He also admitted to using the internet to conduct research to construct TATP and a weapon of mass destruction in addition to purchasing a plane ticket to California on July 28, 2021, to avoid detection by law enforcement after a bombing.
When law enforcement reviewed his electronic devices, there was a video Salmanzadeh recorded on July 22, 2021, threatening to blow up Tascosa High School.
"We are going to blast the school," he said in Farsi. In the video, he showed the nail bomb filled with shrapnel, the suicide vest filled with pipes labeled dynamite, a suitcase filled with container labeled explosives, and a backpack filled with bottles labeled explosives.
There were several other videos uncovered of Salmanzadeh conducting test explosions in addition to several journals that had notes and formulas related to the production of explosives.
"Armed with internet research, this defendant was able to create homemade explosives capable of wreaking mass casualties – casualties he dreamed of inflicting on innocent high schoolers," said U.S. Attorney Chad Meacham. "Without vigilant neighbors who reported the sound of the explosion to authorities and immediate law enforcement intervention, this may have ended in tragedy. Instead, the community is a little bit safer today as this defendant is being held accountable for his criminal activity."