Boulder Daily Camera : Swerlein armory baffles neighbors

Swerlein armory baffles neighbors

Police investigate motive of man who had more than 400 chemicals in home

By Christine Reid | June 24, 2007

People living on Sunset Drive in Longmont had long been accustomed to unexplainable explosions in the middle of the night that shook their homes, weird flashes of light and even small yard fires that went on for a year.

Many residents say they called police and the city to complain, but the noises were dismissed as probably just some kids playing with fireworks.

And then, last weekend, police trying to figure out who was leaving small bombs outside the Longmont Clinic followed up on a tip by a Sunset Drive neighbor. He told them to check out 2404.

After some sleuthing, the neighbor had pinpointed where the bizarre booms were coming from — the home of Ronald Swerlein, 50.

Police have cleared him of any connection to the devices left at the clinic. But after two search warrants and nearly five days of police combing his tan, tri-level house, Swerlein is now facing 10 felony charges of possessing explosives.

Authorities reported pulling out more than 400 chemicals, including a half-pound of nitroglycerin — dynamite's main ingredient.

The discovery has left neighbors scared and police baffled as to what Swerlein's intentions were. But the retired engineer who calls himself a "nerd" says he was just tinkering, teaching himself how to make rocket fuel.

'I know what a bomb sounds like'

Sean Hardy was sitting in his Sunset Drive living room at 11 p.m. on June 9 when he heard what sounded like a bomb detonating right outside his house.

When he went outside to investigate, he later told police, he saw Swerlein's garage door open and whitish-gray smoke billowing out. Hardy then watched the man unscrew a light bulb inside the garage, making it dark, and begin picking debris up off the ground.

Hardy said he didn't know much about his neighbor across the street, except that he had an awful lot of UPS deliveries. It seems none of the neighbors knew much about Swerlein and his wife, Julie Dadone, who have lived in the home since 1981.

Longmont police dispatchers, however, were quite familiar with Swerlein's neighbors, who complained of loud, bomb-like noises that woke some out of deep sleep in the middle of the night. Police reported fielding 15 complaints of bombs, fireworks and shots fired from the area over the past 18 months. But by the time an officer arrived, there were no leads to follow.

Hardy said an officer once parked his car on the street for most of the night to try to crack the case, but that night there were no explosions.

Bob and Cathy Evans said Swerlein was a quiet neighbor who kept to himself.

"Until like 3 in the morning," Bob Evans said.

A bad back keeps Evans awake at night, he said, and during smoke breaks on the back deck, he occasionally heard explosions and saw flashes of light. Police guessed they were firecrackers, he said.

"I was in the Marine Corps, and I know what a bomb sounds like," he said.

Their neighbor Ray Balzer became obsessed with finding the source of the explosions, the Evanses said.

One night, he sat awake in a park at the end of their street all night, hoping to catch the culprit. But again, that night the neighborhood was silent.

Balzer also knocked on all his neighbors' doors, asking if they, too, had heard the noises. All said they had — except for Swerlein.

Balzer called police June 13, when he learned they were looking for help finding who was leaving small bomb devices at the Longmont Clinic. His wife warned police to be careful because of the number and size of the explosions, according to a police report.

Police move in

Longmont police called in federal agents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms to help.

After going through Swerlein's trash June 15 and reporting that they found empty UPS boxes that once contained signal flares or signal pistols, a magazine for a semi-automatic handgun and blackened fragments of a pipe bomb, they asked a judge for a search warrant. They were given permission to go in.

That night at 6:00, SWAT team members surrounded the house and announced they had a warrant. After nobody responded, they shot tear-gas canisters in through the windows, including a large, plate-glass window in the front of the house, police said.

Swerlein and his wife then emerged through the front door. They were handcuffed and taken to a nearby park for questioning.

Officers also took Swerlein's shorts to examine them for evidence, giving him a gown to wear.

Police wearing gas masks swept the house. They said an upstairs bedroom was full of bottles of chemicals, and it appeared there was bomb shrapnel embedded in a wall.

More chemicals were found stuffed in an upstairs closet and strewn around the basement, police said. Several bottles filled a refrigerator, and more were stashed underneath the stairwell.

Police said it looked like things had been blown up in the garage.

Police moved out of the home to let the bomb experts take over. Specialists from several federal agencies, the National Guard and local bomb-team experts worked over the next two days, clearing out the cache.

"No one in this state, or even this region, had ever seen anything like this," said Longmont police Sgt. Tim Lewis.

Many times, crews stopped work because they were stumped and had to put in a call to Quantico, Va., to talk to the nation's top FBI bomb experts, police said.

The process was intensive and time-consuming. Officers took samples from each jar and jug, then sent them to a lab for analysis. Except for the half-pound of nitroglycerin found in the refrigerator and deemed too dangerous to move past the driveway. Bomb experts set up a sand bunker there and blew it up last weekend.

The blast knocked trinkets off neighbors' curio cabinets, clocks off walls and loosened garage windows on the house across the street. The explosion also left cracks in Swerlein's garage door and knocked drywall down inside the garage, police said.

Officers began to compile a list: P.E.T.N.; ammonium perchlorate; nitroglycerin. Two samples of each chemical were kept for evidence, and bomb technicians blew up the rest.

Six guns, including two rifles; more ammunition than the Longmont Police Department had; and books with titles such as "Don't Get Mad, Get Even" and "Your Revenge Is in the Mail."

The initial search was completed last weekend, but authorities returned with a second search warrant Tuesday after learning some items they left behind — such as vitamins and rock tumblers — could be used in bomb-making.

They also found more chemicals, they said, including the explosive M.E.K.P., which is blamed for the liquid ban on U.S. airplanes.

Rocket-fuel 'nerd'

Swerlein has not talked publicly about his case. His attorney, Jeffrey Larson, says people should wait until all the facts are out and not jump to conclusions.

Larson lashed out at the media Friday during Swerlein's charging hearing and asked the judge for a gag order in the case. She deferred to another judge to make the call.

Swerlein's statements to police reveal that he sees himself as a "nerd" who is interested in rocket-fuel technology and teaching himself how to make it in small doses in his garage.

Swerlein has graduate degrees in physics and electrical engineering. He was an engineer and scientist at Hewlett-Packard, which later became Agilent Technologies, in Loveland.

He retired in 2004 after a serious car accident that almost took his life and has since been a recluse. Swerlein said he worked long hours and fell asleep at the wheel one night, colliding head-on with another car.

He still takes pain medication for the serious leg injuries he sustained in the crash.

Police reported finding crushed-up pills in his pockets when they arrested him. Swerlein told them he snorted the prescription drugs to make them work more quickly and last longer.

Swerlein told police he was looking for hobbies to take up in his spare time and got interested in thermites, mixtures of aluminum powder and metal oxides used in welding. He said when they were lit, they would make a "whoosh" sound.

Sometimes he would stand 5 feet away and ignite the chemicals using a wire hooked to a battery. Sometimes he would use a lighter.

He told police that when he began experimenting about a year ago, he "lost containment" with a couple of projects.

Swerlein told police that he dreamed of improving rocket fuel. He wanted to be able to walk into rocketry groups and contribute his knowledge.

He knew it could be "violent," so his tests were done with 3 to 5 grams of chemicals at a time. He surrounded chemicals with tires to absorb the blows.

He made the nitroglycerin and P.E.T.N. himself from chemicals he bought over the Internet. He told police he was proud of his accomplishments — including once firing a homemade rocket with homemade fuel over his house.

Swerlein said his neighbors may have been angry with him because, about eight months ago, he had a laser light that may have disturbed some of them. He said he had been shining it on a tree because it looked "neat," police reported, but he stopped after realizing it was bothering people.

Swerlein admitted to police that there were explosives in his home, but he said he didn't want to use the word "explosive" because they were looking for a bomb-maker.

Police going into his home were safe, he said, as long as they didn't open the bottles.


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[SIDEBAR]:

Compounds found in home

Police reported finding more than 400 chemicals in the Longmont home of Ronald Swerlein. Here are some of the more-dangerous compounds:

Lead azide — A toxic, crystalline compound used as a detonator for explosives. It is so sensitive — it can explode if it falls as little as 6 inches — it is typically stored under water in insulated rubber containers.

Nitroglycerin — A heavy, colorless, oily, explosive liquid used to make dynamite. It also is used in small doses in medications to treat heart conditions. In its pure form, it is very volatile and considered one of the most powerful explosives.

P.E.T.N. — Pentaerythritol tetranitrate is used in ammunitions, land mines and detonation cords and is also considered one of the most powerful explosives. During World War II, 8 ounces of P.E.T.N. shot out of a bazooka gun could penetrate up to 5 inches of armor.

M.E.K.P. — Methyl ethyl ketone peroxide is a highly flammable and explosive peroxide used in manufacturing fiberglass. The clear liquid was named as a possible explosive in a thwarted terrorist attack last year on several planes that resulted in the ban of liquids on U.S. flights.

Sources: answers.com, wikipedia.com, globalsecurity.org

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Contact Camera Staff Writer Christine Reid at 303-473-1355 or reidc@dailycamera.com.