Historical Dictionary of Terrorism Third Edition

OMEGA-7 • 501would explode in the park, which was filled with people attendingan outdoor concert, in one half-hour. Three security guards foundthe knapsack under a park bench and began clearing the area shortlybefore it exploded at 1:20 a.m.On 9 June 1997 the Task Force investigating the Olympic Parkbombing announced it was connected with two other bombings, the16 January 1997 bombing of the Atlanta Northside Family PlanningServices and the 21 February 1997 bombing of the OthersideLounge, for which credit was claimed by the Army of God. Whilethe Olympic Park bomb used Accurate Armsbrand smokeless gunpowder,the other two bombs used dynamite. All three bombs usedWestclox-brand Baby Ben windup alarm clocks and also used steelplates cut from the same sheet. The plates were matched to a sheet ofmetal owned by a friend of Eric Robert Rudolph.On 14 October 1998 Eric Robert Rudolph was charged with theOlympic Park bombing, as well as the two bombings claimed in thename of the Army of God. In February 1998 he had already beencharged with the 29 January 1998 bombing of the New Woman AllWomen Health Care Clinic in Birmingham, Alabama, that killedpolice officer Robert Sanderson and severely injured the clinic’shead nurse, Emily Lyons. Despite an extensive multistate manhunt,Rudolph had eluded capture until his arrest on 31 May 2003. On 6April 2005 Rudolph pleaded guilty to all charges to escape the deathpenalty. On 18 July 2005 he was sentenced to life imprisonment forthe murder of Robert Sanderson, and he was later convicted on 22August 2005 for the bombings committed in Atlanta and sentencedto three concurrent terms of life imprisonment without parole in additionto the sentences for the Alabama bombings. See also ANTI-ABORTION TERRORISM.OMEGA-7. Omega-7 was a nonstate Cuban émigré group with therevolutionary goal of overthrowing the Castro regime in Cuba. Inthe period 1968–1983, over 56 anti-Castro groups claimed creditfor 155 terrorist acts. Of these, only Alpha 66, Brigade 2506, theCuban-American National Foundation (CANF), Cuban NationalistMovement, Cuban Liberation Front, and Omega-7 were of muchconsequence, and only Alpha 66, Omega-7, and the CANF remainedactive into the 1980s. From 1980 to 1982 Omega-7 carried out atleast 18 major terrorist acts, including 10 bombings or attempted