Men behind the Harvard explosion face up to five years in prison for damaging a nearly 120-year-old building over the weekend, the U.S. Department of Justice said this week.
It identified the alleged culprits as 18-year-old Logan David Patterson of Plymouth, Mass., and 20-year-old Dominick Frank Cardoza of Bourne, Mass. Each have been charged with one “count of conspiracy to damage, by means of an explosive, the Goldenson Building at Harvard Medical School.”
This building was designed for Harvard Medical School by Shepley, Rutan and Coolidge of Boston and opened in 1906, according to Harvard University Planning and Design. In the 1990s the building was renovated and dedicated to donors Leonard Goldenson (former president of the American Broadcasting Company) and his wife, Isabella.
A 1994 article in the Harvard Crimson explained that the couple donated $60 million to neuroscience research. It said they became supporters of the field after their daughter Genise was diagnosed with cerebral palsy. At the time the article was published, the building housed 30 laboratories.
One of the labs operating there today is the Harvard Brain Science Initiative (HBI), launched in 2014 by the Office of the Provost of Harvard University.
Per its website, the HBI’s “mission is to promote interdisciplinary and cross-campus interactions amongst neuroscientists in the University and its affiliated hospitals.” It’s located on the first floor of the building. The criminal complaint filed against Patterson and Cardoza this week also noted that the building receives federal funding.
George Q. Daley, the Dean of the Faculty of Medicine at Harvard, said in a Sunday message that the explosion occurred in the building’s fourth floor hallway and that the area was cleared and fully operational. According to the DOJ, the explosion went off at around 3 a.m. Saturday. No injuries were reported.
Patterson and Cardoza were with a group of Wentworth Institute of Technology students on Friday evening for Halloween-related social activities, according to a witness cited in the criminal complaint. That witness said the group traveled from Wentworth to Cambridge, Mass. While the others from the group returned to Wentworth around midnight, according to the witness, they said Patterson and Cardoza stayed out.
That witness also said Patterson later told them “involvement in the explosion” at Harvard, but not in detail. Another witness said “they had placed a cherry bomb in a locker and shut the locker door before the cherry bomb exploded,” and a third witness said Patterson and Cardoza entered the building through the roof and that they heard the two saying they chose it because it looked “abandoned.”
Both suspects were seen nearby the Goldenson building in video surveillance footage, according to the criminal complaint. Some of the surveillance video “shows the two suspects lighting what appear to be roman candle fireworks at approximately 2:24 a.m.”
Then, surveillance video from cameras near the Goldenson Building apparently shows the suspects climbing over a chain-link fence and entering a construction area surrounding the building just after 2:30 a.m. Video shows them climbing scaffolding and accessing the building’s roof. By 2:45 a.m., Harvard police had received an alert of a fire alarm at the building. Between that time and 2:50 a.m., figures are seen exiting through a first-floor emergency exit. After leaving, they fled in opposite directions and tried to change or conceal their clothing. Following news coverage of the story, Wentworth students came to authorities with information.
Investigators determined that an explosive, likely a large, commercial firework, was detonated in a wooden locker in the fourth- floor research laboratory. In another message from Daley published Tuesday, he said that there is no ongoing safety threat and that access to the building was restored.
“We understand that anxieties are high, and news of this ordeal may be upsetting. Please remember that safety and well-being resources are available,” said the message. “[The Harvard University Police Department] will maintain an increased presence on the Longwood campus, which we hope will provide an added sense of comfort and security to our community.”
He also added that an investigation into the incident was ongoing.
Patterson and Cardoza were arrested Tuesday. If they are found guilty of the conspiracy to damage, by means of fire or an explosive charge they could face up to five years in prison, three years of supervised release and a fine of up to $250,000.
“Sentences are imposed by a federal district court judge based upon the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and statutes which govern the determination of a sentence in a criminal case,” said the DOJ.