Bomb-making equipment seized from Fort Pierce man after explosive detonated in city

FORT PIERCE — A man who crafted a bomb inside a whiskey bottle and blew it up in another man's backyard was charged with a crime Wednesday, investigators said.

Scott Frederick Wegener, 55, of the 500 block of Wendell Road, was charged with possession or discharge of a destructive device.

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An anonymous caller Wednesday warned Wegener had detonated an improvised explosive device and was threatening it again, according to Wegener's arrest affidavit.

The caller said Wegener, nicknamed "Spider," was in a dispute with someone over the theft of a BB gun and had offered to pay a friend to crawl under the man's home to plant an IED.

Investigators from the St. Lucie County Sheriff's Office, Fort Pierce Police Department, FBI and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, all responded to Wegener's home Wednesday.

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They didn't find any bomb-making equipment there, only two empty Canadian Mist bottles in a red golf cart.

At a home in the 800 block of South Sixth Street, they found evidence of an explosion in the backyard. The homeowner, Wegener's friend, said the incident happened Saturday.

"Wegener pulled up to (the) house on the golf cart. They began to hang out. Wegener said he was going to kill the chickens in (the) yard. Wegener went to his golf cart and retrieved a Canadian Mist bottle filled with black powder, sand and a green fuse," according to the affidavit.

Investigators said Wegener lit the fuse and threw the IED into the backyard, where it exploded.

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They recovered a 1-pound bag of explosive black powder, 8 feet of "cannon fuse" and a coffee cup filled with sand, which Wegener had left at the Sixth Street home, the affidavit said.

Wegener was charged by the Sheriff's Office. He remained late Friday in the Indian River County Jail, with bail set at $30,000.