Trouble at Work

Mail handler fired after his story about the shooting death of a postal manager is published in an electronic magazine on the World Wide Web. Two men, allegedly disgruntled taxpayers, are charged with planting a bomb outside an IRS building. The bomb fails to ignite. It is the second IRS bombing attempt in a Western state in three months. The regional Office of Worker's Compensation closes its doors to walk-in customers--all federal employees--after getting word that a postal employee threatened to kill office employees. An outpatient of the Veterans Affairs hospital shoots and kills an unarmed hospital police officer. 5,600 federal employees evacuated from the Richard Bolling Building after local police receive a bomb threat. A Forest Service employee says he is roughed up while being ejected from a land movement activists meeting featuring a speaker who urges violent resistance to federal authority over public lands. The employee files suit June 3 charging assault and battery. Tax protester Charles Ray Polk is convicted and sentenced to 20 years in prison for attempting to blow up the Austin IRS Service Center. A Labor Department mine inspector and his wife are injured when a bomb explodes in a pickup truck in which they were riding. Eight hours before, the Labor Department office had received a telephoned death threat. An explosive device blows out the windows in Walker Plaza, a building housing FBI offices. Security is increased in federal offices in Texas, Oklahoma, Louisiana, New Mexico and Arkansas. A homeless, mentally ill Social Security recipient barricades the entrance to the SSA office and threatens to blow up the building. He leaves the building after it is evacuated and is arrested outside. The General Services Administration proposes to eliminate 360 parking places to improve security at 19 federal buildings. A dozen members of the Viper Militia are charged with teaching about explosives and techniques in civil disorder and unlawful possession of weapons. The group made videotapes about blowing up government buildings and discussed tracking down families of federal agents, investigators say. FBI arrests five members of the West Virginia Mountaineer Militia on charges they planned to blow up the FBI's national fingerprint records complex in Clarksburg.