NORTH PERRY, Ohio, April 10 (UPI) -- The owner of an Ohio auto repair shop, bitter over local tax problems, has been charged with plotting to bomb a municipal judge, the mayor and police chief.
Joseph Sands was arrested Sunday outside a store where he had allegedly bought fuses, the Cleveland Plain Dealer reported. His girlfriend, Dawn Holin, was arrested at the home they share in Madison.
Sands operates a repair shop in North Perry, northeast of Cleveland. He has misdemeanor convictions for failing to perform work a customer had paid for and for failure to pay local taxes and was about to be sentenced on another local tax charge.
Sands' alleged targets were Painesville Municipal Judge Michael Cicconetti, who sent him to jail for five days in a tax case and was to preside over another sentencing, North Perry Mayor Thomas Williams and North Perry Police Chief Denise Mercsak.
Cicconetti, who said that he has previously never gotten so much as a "bad phone call" from his work as a judge, moved with his family to a friend's house after learning of the alleged plot.
