Trans Woman Arrested in Bomb Plot

A transgender woman in Idaho — reportedly upset over local police identifying her as male — is accused of rigging four pipe bombs, setting her car on fire, and running nude down a highway.

Fifty homes in Payette, Idaho, had to be evacuated after four pipe bombs were found on the porch of 53-year-old Catherine Carlson's  trailer home; a bomb squad robot later detonated them. Authorities say that in addition to setting up the bombs, Carlson doused her car with gasoline and set it ablaze inside a storage facility. Carlson was spotting racing down a rural highway wearing no clothes.

Carlson was being held on suspicion of use of
weapons of mass destruction, arson, and indecent exposure; she allegedly told police she wanted to bring attention to her "plight" as a transgender woman.

Carlson received a traffic citation in 2007 and had her name listed as Daniel Carlson on some documents (Carlson had gender-reassignment surgery in 1980). Since then Carlson has been jailed four times for minor infractions. During one of those instances, Carlson raised an objection that she was placed in a solitary jail cell instead of with other women.

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