Accused MLK Parade Bomb Plotter Indicted

SPOKANE, WA - A federal grand jury in Washington state indicted a man accused of trying to detonate a bomb along the route of a Martin Luther King Jr. parade in Spokane.

Kevin William Harpham, 36, of Addy, Wash., was to appear in U.S. District Court in Spokane today for arraignment on charges of attempting to use a weapon of mass destruction and possession of an improvised explosive device, The Seattle Times reported.

Harpham was expected to plead not guilty and be assigned a judge and trial date, the newspaper said.

Harpham is accused of leaving a backpack with a rat poison-laced bomb on a bench along the parade route Jan. 17. Sanitation workers found the backpack about 40 minutes before the parade began.

The FBI arrested Harpham March 9.

At one time, Harpham was a member of the neo-Nazi National Alliance, said Mark Potok, director of the Southern Poverty Law Center. However, Erich Gliebe, National Alliance chairman. said Harpham is not a member now.

The SPLC said Harpham posted more than 1,000 entries since 2004 on the Vanguard News Network, a racist and anti-Semitic Web site, and was a contributor to the white nationalist newspaper, The Aryan Alternative, the Times said.