A 32-year-old woman pleaded guilty Tuesday to charges she plotted with two accomplices to set off pipe bombs at a federal courthouse and a Federal Express distribution center in San Diego.
Rachelle Lynette Carlock admitted to using a pipe bomb — a weapon of mass destruction — to commit a crime, along with co-defendants Eric Reginald Robinson and Ella Louise Sanders, FOX 5 San Diego reported.
Carlock told the court she purchased explosives materials and stole pipes for the purpose of constructing the small bombs. She said she was in a difficult place in her life at the time of the crimes.
"I was forced to do it," Carlock told the judge without elaborating, according to FOX 5 San Diego.
Carlock was charged with using and carrying a destructive device in relation to a crime of violence. She be sentenced to 30 years in prison in March, the station said.
Carlock also confessed that on May 4, 2008, she personally planted and detonated three pipe bombs at the Edward J. Schwartz Federal Courthouse in San Diego, according to a court press release.
Robinson and Sanders previously pleaded guilty to one count of possession and use of a destructive device to commit a crime of violence, and to conspiracy to use a weapon of mass destruction.
"The bombs detonated at the federal courthouse in San Diego posed a serious threat not only to people and property at the courthouse, but to citizens passing by," said Karen P. Hewitt, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of California.
"This prosecution serves as a reminder that the law imposes very stern penalties for the unlawful use of bombs, explosives or other destructive devices."
Click here to read more on this story from FOX5SanDiego.com.
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