CHICAGO – Two 21-year-old men from the Chicago suburbs face felony charges in Florida after they allegedly detonated dynamite in a Daytona Beach Shores hotel during spring break revelry last week.
Timothy Becktel, of La Grange, and Michael Bolt, of La Grange Park, along with Christopher Romano, 21, of Dayton, Ohio, have posted bond and were released, according to Daytona Beach Shores police.
The dynamite’s blast about 2:30 a.m. Friday blew glass, twisted metal and other debris 100 feet, Sgt. Michael Fowler said. Three hurricane-proof windows of tempered glass shattered, including one in a nearby hotel room where two parents and a child were sleeping.
The family was not injured, probably because the drapes were closed and the material stopped the blast of broken glass, Fowler said. Becktel and Bolt both had minor lacerations from flying debris, he said.
Even for a community used to dealing with out-of-control young people on spring break, a dynamite detonation reaches a new level of dangerous prank, Fowler said.
“This ranks pretty high,” he said. “This was extremely reckless behavior.”
A Daytona Beach Shores police officer who was patrolling the area said the blast was so intense he could feel its impact on his chest, Fowler said.
Witnesses said the explosion erupted from a second-floor sundeck at the Oceanside Inn, Fowler said. The windows blew out, and a metal light pole on the deck was destroyed. Surveillance video from the inn’s internal cameras showed the three men running from the site in two opposite directions after the dynamite detonated.
Becktel told police that fellow spring break partiers had detonated a stick of dynamite on the beach the previous night and gave the trio the quarter-stick they detonated early Friday morning, Fowler said.
Becktel and Bolt served as lookouts, while Romano detonated the stick, Fowler said.
The hotel estimated about $2,000 in property damages and another $8,000 to $10,000 in lost revenue.
The three were charged with discharging a destructive device, criminal mischief, and disorderly conduct, police said.
Comments are no longer available on this story