Posted on 09/17/2007 8:21:43 AM PDT by LurkedLongEnough
Police Release 9 Threatening Postcards
OCALA, Fla. -- Investigators in Marion County, Fla., are searching for the author of nine postcards sent to different schools on the same day with the words 'Jihad-Boom" and handwritten cartoons of a building apparently exploding with people inside.
Investigators released the postcards with the threatening drawings on them Monday in hopes of generating leads in the case.
Officials said that the postcards are made up of various and traditional themes, and each one has a distinctive hand-drawn cartoon on it. Several of the threats arrived on postcards featuring Walt Disney World.
Detectives said the threat-maker crossed his or her No. 7s and attached a suffix to the address. Six of the nine postcards spell the word "Jihad" correctly, while the others are incorrect.
The U.S. Postal Service said that the postcards were all mailed to the schools from the Ocala-Gainesville mailing district before the sixth anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
A $10,000 reward has been issued to anyone who provides information which leads to the arrest and conviction of the person or persons responsible for using the postal service to mail the threatening postcards to schools.
[See site for pictures of the postcards.]
bump! bump! bump!
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re-bump!
I think you are referring to this one:
“The 1999 crash of EgyptAir 990, killing 217 - by a co-pilot not supposed to be near the aircraft’s controls at that time who repeated 11 times “I rely on God” as he wrenched the plane down - went unexplained by the National Transportation Safety Board.”
http://www.danielpipes.org/article/2396
You could be right, but I thought at the time of 9/11 someone said this calendar had the drawing on the right page to match the 9/11 date. Funny how I can’t find anything online.
from above link.
Update: One of our visitors has pointed out the possible significance of a 10/10 date. It is the day the US Congress gave President George Bush authorization to use military force against Iraq.
Great find...they do seem to like ‘anniversary’ dates. It is even more frightening as the 10th falls towards the very end of RamaLamaDingDong.
I've taught high school for nearly 18 years now, the last 12 in the inner city. I can narrow it down. Only a ninth grader is so unbelievably STUPID as to do this and get a giggle out of it. Don't get me wrong, ninth graders are usually working with a "full six pack," they just lack the little plastic thinghie that keeps it all together. I'm of the opinion that 9th graders should be staked to a chain in the back yard and fed raw meat until they become seniors and are thereby readmitted to the human race. Thankfully I teach seniors. My Principal realized the wisdom in giving me a schedule free of 9th graders so as to maintain the same number of living bodies in the afternoon as reported to school in the morning....
It’s not that big a story here in Florida. Here’s some info in the Ocala paper:
http://www.ocala.com/article/20070918/NEWS/209180335/1025/NEWS
It mentions that the postcards arrived prior to 9/11, which prompted special security measures in the high schools that day, although they were only made public yesterday, in hopes that the public could provide leads. The police haven’t found any traceable fingerprints on the cards. They had exact postage (26 cent postcard postage). The article seemed to imply that the handwriting may be that of more than one person.
A faint impression of the words “Matthew A.” was found on some of the post cards, although since it’s not clear where the postcards came from in the first place, this may not mean anything. However, they questioned all high school students named Matthew whose last name began with A. No results, of course.
I don’t think this sounds like something a kid would do, in any case. It’s way too precise (the exact postage, the correct zip codes, etc.) and I doubt that a teenager would think of using old postcards. I think it’s an adult who has some regular contact with the schools or the school board.
So much mail handling is automated, and so much of the manual work is almost robotic in nature, that it would surprise me if someone in a post office DID notice such postcards. Besides, technically, it would probably be illegal for the postal employee to read the postcards.
The best pictures of the postcards seem to be the ones on the web site for the Star Banner. Click on the zoom option.
The article says,
Seven of nine postcards were released. They had been sent to the School Board office, the Marion Technical Insitute and Belleview, Dunnellon, Forest, North Marion and Vanguard high schools. All contain a hand-drawn cartoon apparently showing a building blowing up and dead bodies strewn around it.
Threatening postcards had also been addressed to West Port and Lake Weir high schools.
The cities addressed are all in Marion County: Ocala, Belleview, Dunnellon and Citra.
It may be significant that the two postcards NOT shown in news stories are from West Port High School and Lake Weir High School, both located in Ocala.
However, the fact that the School Board was addressed on one of the postcards still indicates to me that the sender of the postcards has some issue with the school board. He probably sent postcards to the schools because they are under that School Board.
Another indicator that the School Board is the the real focus of the anger is that the drawing on the postcard sent to them is LARGER than most of the others, except possibly the one sent to Dunnellon. Those two were probably the first ones addressed.
Just more thoughts.
'Sept. 11' Threats Prompt School Backpack Ban In Fla. County
Written Letters Reference Terrorist Attacks
POSTED: 5:40 pm EDT September 10, 2007
UPDATED: 9:41 am EDT September 11, 2007
MARION COUNTY, Fla. -- Threats referencing the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks mailed to schools in Marion County prompted officials to ban backpacks and book bags on all public school campuses Tuesday....
That may well be, but consider this: Imagine Arabic is your first language, and that some European language (indicated by the crossed sevens) was your second--they don't cross the sevens in England. English is your third language. How much trouble might you have transliterating "jihad" into English?
To: metmom
“Otherwise, who’d get the blame?”
Heh. See what you mean.
I kind of blew it off as a kid’s prank at first but looking at the handwriting makes me think “English as a second language”. The way the characters were essentially drawn makes me think that their primary alphabet is not a Western one.
17 posted on 09/17/2007 1:40:08 PM PDT by L98Fiero (A fool who'll waste his life, God rest his guts.)
I'm right there with you. ;)
Just including you! :-)
Time for America to wake up.
It probably is, but keep this in mind: We have done a very good job of preventing Al Qaida attacks over the last six years, and the terror activity that's happened on American soil since has been carried out by people "inspired" by Islamism. And most of them have been reallt stupid to boot, like the guys who were going to attack Ft. Dix and sent a tape of their training to be processed at a video store. Even the Columbine shooters had better secrecy than that.
Here's a WW2 POW record that will make clear how some foreigners got in the habit of crossing sevens:
They write their ones with long serifs that make them look like sevens, except then they cross the sevens, resolving the ambiguity. For example, it is clear that Waffen SS Pvt. Grass was born on October 16 Okt 1927, not 76 Okt 1927, that he was 18 years old, not 78, and that he was 171 cm tall, not 777.
Theo, That was an Egypt Air flight that went down in the Atlantic (I think off of Peggy’s Cove). That was another of the Jihadists’ successes, although it was shrugged off at the time as a pilot who was “depressed” over the loss of a child. There are other representations of the 9-11 event on Islamist calendars before the event took place. Remember, it was a long time in the planning, and when the calendars were printed and distributed, they never dreamed of what a success the attack would be.
Then there were the little Islamic kids at a school in Brooklyn telling their classmates, a week before the event, that they heard their parents and the parents’ friends talking about two big buildings in Manhattan that would be “brought down”. Also several Brooklyn Islamic families left the area just before 9-11. Muslims were tipped off about the planned event.
Go back and read some of the FR threads from September and October of 2001. You’ll learn a lot.
Hah! A very accurate description of ninth graders!
(I am a former jr. high teacher...8th graders are ALMOST as bad.)
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