Worker’S Motive For Bomb Materials Not Believed Sinister Known Jokingly As ‘Unabomber,’ He Sold Fireworks To Colleagues

Investigators continued to gather evidence Friday on a PG&E worker charged with possessing a bomb, but authorities are strongly discounting that the San Franciscan was any sort of Oklahoma City bomber in the making.

Paul J. Madronich Jr., 44, is being held on $1 million bail on three charges of possessing explosives.

Although Madronich is believed to have stored at work 250 pounds of ammonium nitrate, a fertilizer used in much larger quantities in the Oklahoma City bombing, police say he did not appear to have a violent agenda or dangerous intentions.

He was arrested Thursday after authorities turned up a small bomb, fuses, bomb-making manuals and other potentially explosive chemicals, including a 33-gallon drum of calcium nitrate, another fertilizer used in explosives.

Assistant District Attorney Jean Daly said Madronich appeared to be motivated by profit rather than politics, selling his small devices, such as cherry bombs and M-80s, to co-workers who nicknamed him “the Unabomber” for his interest in such materials.

“I think much too much is being made of this,” Madronich’s attorney, Jerry Ladar, said Friday. He noted that his client has no police record, and has been responsible at Pacific Gas & Electric Co., where he’s worked 19 years, for preventing potentially explosive gas leaks. The “Unabomber” nickname, he argued, speaks a great deal about Madronich.

“When your co-workers would call you an awful name like that, and not report it to their superiors,” Ladar said, “it shows he is fascinated with fireworks and explosives, but is not considered to be dangerous.”

Authorities are refusing to describe in any detail the small bomb that Madronich is charged with possessing, but Ladar said Friday he believes it is fireworks.

He said he would ask Tuesday, when Madronich will be arraigned in San Francisco Municipal Court, to have his client’s bail reduced.

The investigation began Thursday after a worker in PG&E’s Mission District service center noticed an odd leak that led authorities to five 50-pound bags of ammonium nitrate, a fertilizer that can become a deadly explosive if mixed with fuel oil.

In this case, it was not mixed with oil. But the discovery spawned an investigation by San Francisco police and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. After tracking down Madronich and searching another PG&E building, Madronich’s house and car, authorities found the cache of materials that could be used for making bombs.

Aside from the bomb, none of the items was assembled, and so were not immediately dangerous.

Madronich could face additional charges in federal court if it is determined the ammonium nitrate was to be used for an illegal purpose - such as explosives. The charges he faces are not linked to the ammonium nitrate, which is not against the law to possess.

Madronich, who lives with his parents, was described by neighbors as a polite, well-behaved man.

The FBI, which would be extensively involved in any investigation of an Oklahoma City-style bomb-making operation has bowed out of the case, since there’s no evidence that a huge, violent plot was being hatched, a spokesman said.

“There’s no indication he was going to build a bomb,” he said. “It was firecrackers, that kind of thing.”

But if that’s the case, there are still some crucial questions to answer. Why would someone making cherry bombs and firecrackers need 250 pounds of ammonium nitrate?

Detective John Thiel of the UC Berkeley Police Bomb Squad said ammonium nitrate is not the type of chemical that would work with firecracker-type devices.

Instead, he said, cherry bombs and firecrackers are made with such things as potassium chlorate and sugar, or aluminum powder.

Perhaps, he said, the suspect was moving on to bigger things.

“People who play with explosives get a certain kick out of blowing things up,” he said.

Madronich’s attorney, however, said his understanding is that the fertilizer is “quite effective” when used to make cherry bombs.