TAMPA, Fla. — A year and a half before he was accused of plotting to bomb his high school, a shirtless and shoeless Jared Cano confronted police with a metal baseball bat when they came to his apartment looking for a stolen pistol, which they eventually found in his bedroom. He was 15 at the time but already had several run-ins with police.
Cano’s troubled history is outlined in police reports released after investigators uncovered what they say was a plan to attack Freedom High School in Tampa, which had expelled him last year. None of the previous juvenile charges — from burglary to firearm possession — ended in a conviction.
Yet it appears that this week’s bomb plot went beyond angry teenage bluster. Detectives said Cano had amassed shrapnel, plastic tubing, and timing and fuse devices for pipe bombs. The attack plan that investigators found Tuesday was mapped out minute-by-minute.
School-safety expert Kenneth Trump said the plans showed a “high probability” that Cano would have carried out an attack. The Associated Press
