UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Wednesday, May 3, 1995
7A
Man in custody made small bombs
The Associated Press
TOPEKA — Gary Alan Land changed after his father died when he was 15 or 16 years old, three childhood acquaintances said yesterday.
Michael Johnson, Ralph Hertzfeldt and Scott Peterson attended elementary through high school with Land in Topeka.
They described him in separate interviews as an ordinary youth who, as Johnson said, "kind of came apart at the seams" after his father died about two decades ago.
Johnson and Hertzfeldt said they believed Land turned to drugs, and Hertzfeldt said he seemed spacy when they met again by chance when both were in their 20s.
Land was charged with criminal damage to property and battery in two separate incidents in Topeka in the mid-1980s. None of the Topeka charges were drug-related, but the state alleged in the battery incident that he was intoxicated.
All three one-time friends said Land was into making small bombs from firecrackers when he was young, but they said they had no knowledge that he had ever made any large bombs.
They haven't had contact with Land for years.
Johnson and Hertzfeldt still live in Topeka; Peterson lives in Oklahoma City.
Land, 35, was being held late yesterday in Springfield, Mo., as a material witness in the Oklahoma City bombing. He and another man were taken into custody by FBI agents and other law enforcement officers at a motel early yesterday.
After Land's father died, Johnson said, "He just kind of changed. His father meant quite a bit to him. He just kind of came apart at the seams."
concerned about what he had been hearing about Land's physical condition that he went to where Land was living.
Johnson said he once became so
"He was pretty bad off the last time I saw him." Johnson said.
the saw in him, Johnson said.
Johnson described the bomb-
making of the group as amateurish
and harmless.
"Every Fourth of July we'd get together...just kind of make tape bombs, we called them, out of masking tape, using the leftover firecrackers."
Hertzfeldt said he had encountered Land at a south Topeka shopping center several years ago.
"He had changed quite a bit," Hertzfeldt said. "He was close-mouthed, a little spacy. He got into something, I figured it was probably drugs. He said he was working in a warehouse in Kansas City."
Hertzfeldt said as a youth Land was "kind of rowdy and outgoing, but he wasn't real bad."
He said he remembered making firecracker bombs, describing it as "just kids' stuff; just playing with fireworks."
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