Prosecutors want charges in Waseca school plot reinstated

Waseca prosecutors are asking the state Court of Appeals to decide whether teenager John LaDue carried out enough of his unfulfilled family slaying and school massacre plans to be prosecuted for attempted murder and attempted property damage.

In court filings this week, prosecutors argue that a district judge incorrectly dismissed the most serious charges against the teen, who had amassed weapons and detonated practice explosives before authorities arrested him in late April. He told officers that he had planned to go on his killing spree within the next month.

They are seeking to have those charges reinstated and quoted excerpts from LaDue's journal in which he detailed his plot, including such passages as: "I don't care if you are my best friend or my family. I'm not gonna hesitate to pull the trigger." The teen used the phrase "A.B.K." throughout his journal — a term which he later told authorities meant "Always Be Killing," according to the filing. He admitted he was going to wear a black duster jacket during his school attack because it looked like one worn by Eric Harris during the killing spree at Columbine in Colorado.

Judge Gerald Wolf let stand six counts of possession of explosive devices against LaDue, but dismissed the most serious charges in July, saying prosecutors hadn't shown that the boy's actions went beyond "mere preparation." The judge found that LaDue did not injure anyone, verbally or physically threaten, brandish or shoot a firearm toward his family or a school liaison officer, or transport materials to the locations in his plan. That made LaDue's actions "remote to both the time and place of the intended crimes," the judge ruled.

But prosecutors wrote that the ruling "requires an offender to be on the brink of committing the crime in order to be liable for attempt." They argued that such an interpretation increases the risk of harm to the public and undermines "the preventive goal of attempt law."

Officers found LaDue on April 29 with bomb-making materials after a citizen called police when she saw him suspiciously enter a storage locker. When authorities approached him, he told them of his plans to kill his parents and sister with a .22-caliber rifle and go to school with pressure-cooker bombs, firearms and ammunition, setting off explosions in the cafeteria, shooting the school liaison officer and killing students. They confiscated chemicals, several guns, ammunition and a few completed explosives, some at the locker and some at his home.

Prosecutors outlined nine actions LaDue took to reach his goal, including getting a job and a debit card so he would have money and means to buy bomb supplies, stockpiling firearms and ammunition, buying a pressure cooker and ball bearings, making and detonating explosive devices and obtaining the storage unit.

They asked the appeals court to consider cases in other states, including one in which the Colorado Supreme Court reinstated the conviction of a woman planning to use pipe bombs to kill. She was arrested before producing working bombs or placing them within striking range of victims, but there was enough evidence of her "determined and sustained efforts" to carry out her plan, the court there ruled, according to prosecutors.

LaDue's parents have steadfastly stood by their son, saying they believe he never would have actually carried out the plan.

Pam Louwagie • 612-673-7102