Caltech grad student held in Hummer torchings
FBI agents arrested a 23-year-old Caltech graduate student Tuesday and charged him in connection with a brazen string of environmentally motivated attacks last summer that caused more than $3.5 million in damage to four auto dealerships in the San Gabriel Valley.
Maybe now the FBI will return Josh Connole’s property they seized when they erroneously thought he was involved.
The suspect apparently used Cal-Tech computers to send emails to a LA Times reporter claiming he did it, and Josh didn’t, earning him The PoliZeros Big Duh Award for cluelessness.
Six Caltech computers in two libraries had been used to send e-mail to The Times, investigators learned. Cottrell’s personal library access card was used to enter the libraries within eight minutes of when the messages were sent to the newspaper, records showed.
Records also showed that on 11 occasions, someone using Cottrell’s student account was logged on to a Caltech computer about the same time it was used to access the e-mail account that appeared on the messages to The Times.
He probably thought he was being clever by using library computers. He wasn’t. Folks, email is easy to track.