Durham man jailed for making pipe bomb

Feb 27 2009 By ncjMedia Newsdesk

A man described as a ``bedroom Rambo" was jailed for a year today for making a pipe bomb at the Durham school where his father worked as a caretaker.

David Riding spent months making the potentially lethal explosive, which he kept locked in a safe hidden beneath his bed.

A judge said he feared the 21-year-old was a dangerous obsessive and had ordered psychiatric reports, after likening his secretive actions to US-style high school massacres.

But the reports failed to prove the pony-tailed biker was dangerous or had intended to set off the bomb.

Judge Christopher Prince said he was jailing Riding as a deterrent to others.

He said: ``I think this offence is too serious to attract a community penalty.

``The public would be shocked if they thought that anybody could make such a dangerous item as this and not expect to receive a custodial sentence, except in the most exceptional circumstances."

He said the pipe bomb could have been as dangerous as a loaded gun.

``It might have gone off and it is that risk of it going off or being taken by persons and being set off that the court wish to deter others from taking."

Newcastle Crown Court heard how a bomb disposal team was called to Durham High School for Girls in November last year, when police discovered a 13cm-long copper pipe bomb hidden in a locked safe under Riding’s bed.

The home he shared with parents, Keith and Karen, lies within school grounds.

Riding, who made the bomb using information he found on the internet, claimed he manufactured the device to see if it could be done.

He waited two to three months for pyrotechnic powder he extracted from commercial fireworks to dry before packing it into the device.

Riding scratched ``killer" on the bomb, which was found with two imitation firearms, three knives, a knuckle-duster and blank rounds.

He was convicted by a jury of making an explosive substance without a lawful purpose, following a three day trial in Durham.

Mitigating, Ian West said Riding was a ’bedroom Rambo`` whose actions were the result of "youthful stupidity and irresponsibility`` and nothing more.

``He likes to go down to the woods with his mates, fire the guns, cut branches off the trees with his big knives, and make camp fires," he said.

``And one of those things he did was to have this pipe bomb, which he never intended to set off."

Judge Prince said there was nothing in the psychiatric and pre-sentence reports to suggest Riding was a dangerous man with a dangerous fascination with weapons.

Riding learnt how to make pipe bombs while a pupil at Durham Johnston Comprehensive School, using a school computer to access a website offering instructions. He built the device in early 2006.

Riding, who worked at a Homebase store and later Houghton Hardware, kept the existence of the bomb from his parents because he feared it would jeopardise his father’s job.

More on this story in The Journal tomorrow.