PHILADELPHIA — A 24-year-old Philadelphia man has been charged with using explosives to blow up a cash machine as demonstrations rocked the city this month.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office said it would oppose bail for David Elmakayes at a hearing scheduled for Friday.
Elmakayes was charged Thursday with using an explosive device to damage property and being a felon in possession of a firearm. It’s not immediately clear if he has a lawyer in the case. Elmakayes has been in custody since city police arrested him on June 4, court records show.
Authorities say he was carrying three additional explosive devices and other weapons when he was arrested shortly after a cash machine in North Philadelphia was damaged on the night of June 3.
Philadelphia police have said that 50 cash machines were hit by explosives that week, amid the civil unrest that struck the nation after George Floyd died after who died in Minneapolis after a police officer pressed his knee into his neck as he pleaded for air. Other cities reported a smaller number of vandalized cash machines.
“Blowing up an ATM and illegal firearms possession are not acts of protest against perceived injustice. They are federal felonies and will be treated as such,” said U.S. Attorney William McSwain of Philadelphia.
