NORFOLK, Va., Feb. 23 (UPI) -- A court has sentenced a young Virginia man to prison for plotting to detonate homemade bombs and use shotguns to kill high school classmates.
Judge William O'Brien sentenced Philip Bay, 19, to a total of 68 years in prison, all but 12 suspended, for his 2010 plot to kill at least 30 former classmates at Landstown High School with homemade bombs and sawed-off shotguns.
The plot never came to fruition and was thwarted weeks beforehand when Bay and two alleged co-conspirators were arrested on a tip.
Bay was ordered to serve two years in a juvenile facility and transfer to an adult prison when he is 21, The (Norfolk) Virginian-Pilot reported Wednesday.
"The offense here is absolutely horrendous," Judge O'Brien said. Not once, he said, did he hear Bay say he never would have carried out his plan.
One of Bay's defense attorneys Eric Korslund never disputed the student plotted the attack and went for an insanity defense arguing the young man was bipolar and suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder brought on by his father's physical and emotional abuse.
The jury rejected the insanity defense during a 6-day trial in November.
