Explosions rattle residents

Cloquet police responded to a pair of explosions in October that shook a south Cloquet neighborhood and left one resident to wonder whether he’d been the subject of political violence.

“My concern was they didn’t kill somebody,” said John Badger, 55, whose home is located at 1341 Valley View Drive. “It was more powerful than a firework. I had aluminum cans disintegrated into pieces of shrapnel and bottles turned to dust.”

Badger sprang from his couch to a “loud bang” sometime after 10 p.m. Oct. 16, he said, and he witnessed a neighbor also come out of his house wondering what happened. Social media respondents also wondered what the explosions were.

It wasn’t until morning that Badger realized it was his recycling bin that had been targeted and was strewn about the roadway.

“I thought, ‘Holy cow, that’s my can laying in the road,’” Badger said. “There was stuff everywhere. I thought a goldarn bear got into it.”

Cloquet police responded to two explosions Oct. 16-17, occurring within a mile of one another, in the area of Braun Park, according to incident reports obtained by the newspaper.

Both explosions, including one on Roland Road responded to by police at 10:47 p.m., occurred in garbage or recycling bins. The explosions took place within 20 minutes of each other.

“The residents of the [Roland Road] house stated they heard another bang to the south of them,” the report said.

Police chief Derek Randall said responding police suspected mortar-style fireworks, of the sort that would not be legal in the state. Officers did not locate or arrest anyone in the incidents, Randall said.

The Roland Road residents furnished police with security video of one of the explosions. While no suspects or vehicles could be seen in the video, “[the homeowner] stated she could hear what sounded like a truck leaving the area,” the incident report said. But the truck was not visible on camera, the report added.

“If caught, various crimes could be applied, including criminal damage to property, reckless use of explosives or fireworks, public nuisance, endangerment or disorderly conduct, and potential civil liabilities,” Randall said in an emailed statement.

The Roland Road report called the device “an explosive of some kind placed in [the can],” and alternately, “the explosion, which appeared to be a firework of some kind.”

The garbage bin was partly melted, police said, and there was a burn mark on the ground.

Badger suspected something more nefarious than fireworks at his property.

“I swept the street for an hour-and-a-half,” Badger said. “There was just stuff everywhere. It was so powerful it blew debris to both sides of the road and down the road.”

He stopped cleaning temporarily on the morning of Oct. 17 in order to call police once he realized it wasn’t a bear-related situation. The recycling can smelled like gunpowder, he said, and he put two and two together from having experienced the explosion the night before.

The explosion was so hot, he said, that normally pliable plastic containers grew brittle and fell apart in his hands, he said. Glass bottles were “pulverized to dust,” Badger said. There were pieces of aluminum cans in surrounding trees, he added. The incident occurred the same week that Badger said his Democratic party political signs were repeatedly uprooted and thrown into the woods, so that he’d have to go find them every day.

“It all happened after hours,” said Badger, who lives with his two children.

He suggested an explosive device was duct-taped to the inside of the can. He did not know how the explosion was detonated, but he found lots of duct tape at the site of the explosion.

“It was a big explosion,” Badger said. “Somebody went out of their way to strap it [in the can]. It would have blown your head off.”

Badger told police that on the day of the explosion he received a notification on his phone from his Ring security camera. Security video appeared to show an adult running through his yard at 6 p.m. Because Badger had not yet set up his subscription, he was unable to retrieve any recorded footage, the incident report said.

Badger wondered aloud what was going on in Cloquet, citing Nazi symbols found graffitied in Cloquet and Carlton County over the summer.

Political violence or not, “I can’t wait until this election is over,” Badger said.