Fred Hampton Unit of the People's Forces
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| Purpose | Prison reform |
|---|---|
| Headquarters | United States |
| Origins | Splintered off from SCAR (Statewide Corrections Alliance for Reform) |
| Leader | Richard Joseph Picariello |
The Fred Hampton Unit of the Peoples Forces was a group led by Richard Joseph Picariello, that set off a series of bombs in Massachusetts and one in Seabrook, New Hampshire, targeting government infrastructure just before the United States Bicentennial. No fatalities or injuries were reported as a result of these bombings. They named themselves after Black Panther leader, Fred Hampton.
The first bombing took place on August 7, 1976 around 12:45a.m. at the Dorchester Armory for the National Guard.[1] They placed the bomb on top of the gas tank of a truck while one of the men, Everett Carlson, poured gasoline under the trucks parked next to it. Another member, Edward Patrick Gullion, poured gas under the vehicles parked on the other side.[2] The blast went off in the armory parking lot, severely damaging two, two‐and‐a‐half‐ton military trucks slightly damaging two others. Seven minutes prior, police had received a phone call who named the group and made threats towards a fleet of square-rigger ships that were coming in the following weekend for the bicentennial visit from Queen Elizabeth of Britain.[3]
Nearly an hour later at 1:40p.m., a female employee at the Eastern Air Lines terminal at Logan International, received a call from a man that stated “You better get clear of the terminal. A plane will be blown up,”. Soon thereafter, an explosion destroyed an Eastern Airlines Electra turboprop liner on the tarmac along with a secondary explosion in the fuel tank. Afterward, police received a call from the man who said “This is the Fred Hampton Peoples Force, and we are responsible for the bombing, you’ll receive further communiques and demands from us.”[4][3][5]
Almost an hour later at 2:45p.m., a third explosion went off at the Essex County Courthouse in Newburyport in the probation office on the second floor. The police described it as “a real strong explosion” caused by perhaps more than dozen sticks of dynamite.[3]
At 11p.m. the same day, a post office in Seabrook, New Hampshire was destroyed by an explosion that sent an air condition unit 40-feet form the building.
The group was also connected to the bombing of Central Main Power Company in Maine and 11 other bombings of infrastructure and corporations.[6]
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