Two Charlotte men – one who worked at the airport — have been arrested and charged with making and possessing a “weapon of mass destruction” – in this case, a pipe bomb.
According to CMPD, officers on Nov. 3 went to an address in the 300 block of Minitree Lanen after someone called 911 to report a homemade explosive device.
Police said Derrick Fells, 39, confessed to making the bomb.
According to a CMPD spokesman, Fells said he had planned to use the bomb against a neighbor with whom he had an ongoing dispute. But Fells changed his mind, CMPD said, and gave the bomb to another man — 30-year-old Paul George Dandan, a Federal Aviation Administration employee at Charlotte Douglas International Airport.
A CMPD report did not address how Dandan may have planned to use the bomb.
Airport officials, in a statement released through CMPD, said Dandan worked in the air traffic control tower and “had no access to the restricted areas of the terminal or ramp. He did not have access to any aircraft at the Airport.”
The FAA also released a statement, saying it had “terminated the employee’s access to the facility and is cooperating with law enforcement authorities.”
On Friday, both men were arrested.
Dandan was charged with possession of a weapon of mass destruction, acquiring a weapon of mass destruction and transporting a weapon of mass destruction.
Fells was charged with three counts of manufacturing a weapon of mass destruction and one count of possession of a weapon of mass destruction.
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