On Thursday (May 19), he pled guilty to four charges relating to the crime, which occurred on June 7, 2020, as well as other offences.
The 19-year-old was charged with two counts of making explosives without a license, one for doing a reckless act involving a hazardous or harmful material and the other for aiding a reckless act using a dangerous or harmful substance.
The Children and Young Persons Act protects persons who are accused of committing crimes before turning 18 years old.
During the 2020 Covid-19 circuit breaker, he began conducting internet research on firearms, bomb-making, sparkler bombs, and other explosives.
This led him to research pipe bombs, and between May and June of that year, he decided to create homemade pipe bombs.
In court filings, Deputy Public Prosecutor Sean Teh stated that on June 7, 2020, the suspect made plans with a friend to meet at East Coast Park and pick a quiet location to detonate the homemade pipe bombs.
The court heard that he left his house at around 7.30 p.m. with two pipe bombs and several sparkler explosives that he had made himself.
He took his e-scooter to the park to meet his friend and his friend's friend, and the three of them then proceeded to the skate park there.
They chose to explode their homemade pipe bombs there since it was quiet, according to DPP Teh.
The offender took out his homemade sparkler bombs, positioned them on an area of grass, and used a single sparkler as a fuse. He observed flames emanating from the homemade sparkler explosives, but they did not explode.
He then took up one of the homemade sparkler bombs and hurled it onto a patch of grass, causing it to explode upon impact.
He then planted his two homemade pipe bombs on the same piece of grass, lit the fuse to detonate both, and ran away. One of the homemade pipe bombs exploded, producing a loud explosion. It resulted in no injuries.
The perpetrator's mobile phone captured the detonation and explosion of the homemade pipe bomb, and he uploaded the footage to his Instagram account.
In April 2019, he had also released a video of an improvised sparkler bomb exploding in East Coast Park. On the offender's instructions, his companion lit and tossed the bomb into the open sea, where it detonated.
On June 19, 2020, a police report was filed over the account's photographs and videos of improvised bombs.
The next day, police executed a search warrant at his residence and discovered various items related to the construction of an improvised bomb, including a package of matchstick boxes and a container containing a dark powdery substance and wood residue.
According to court records, an Institute of Mental Health report dated August 7, 2020 revealed that the offender was diagnosed and treated for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and conduct disorder between July 25, 2017 and April 9, 2020.
On June 30, he will return to court for sentencing.
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