FBI investigating attempted bombing at Satanic Temple headquarters in Salem
The FBI is assisting local police in the investigation of an explosive device that was hurled on the front porch of the Satanic Temple's international headquarters in Salem, Massachusetts, on Monday.
No one was inside the Victorian mansion and former funeral home on Bridge Street that serves as the Satanic Temple's command center when someone lobbed the explosive early Monday morning, according to a statement from the Salem Police Department.
The FBI's Joint Terrorism Task Force is assisting in the investigation, Salem Police said.
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"While this is frightening for those of us who live and work in Salem, particularly so the workers and neighbors of the Satanic Temple, I take great comfort in the assistance of the FBI," Police Chief Lucas Miller said in the statement.
"I am confident that between our federal partners and our own excellent SPD Detectives, we will find and arrest the perpetrator and hopefully, that will serve as a deterrent to anyone who sees the temple as a target."
The incident drew sharp condemnation from Democratic Salem Mayor Dominick Pangallo, who described it as a "terrorist attack."
"While I am glad no one was injured in this attack, I nevertheless condemn this action in the strongest possible way," Pangallo said in a statement.
"Salem is a welcoming place and violent attacks like this are utterly reprehensible," he continued. "On behalf of the city, I want to extend our support for the staff and members at the Temple and the residents of the neighborhood who have been impacted by this crime."
The device failed to fully detonate, police say. But Santaic Temple co-founder Lucien Greaves told The Boston Globe that the bomb "fizzled out, scorching some of the front of the house."
Bomb technicians with state police "ensured that the device was no longer a danger and explosive ordinance detection K9s swept the location for secondary devices."
Greaves, who had given a tour of the temple to several people shortly before they discovered the bomb, told The Globe that he also considers the act to be terrorism.
"This is certainly a terroristic threat," he was quoted as saying. "People could have been hurt. ... People come and visit from all types of different places, [and] people come and bring their families. We have family friendly events. I don't know how anybody could feel that they are justified in doing anything like this."
Greaves said that the Satanic Temple finds "a real power in the mythology of Satan, but from a Miltonian perspective in which Satan is the ultimate rebel against tyranny," referencing the epic poem Paradise Lost by John Milton.
"So to that end, we're often fighting to preserve free speech liberties and equal access liberties, and true religious freedom, which means government neutrality insofar as religious perspective is concerned."
The Satanic Temple has been targeted with violence before. Earlier this year, a Michigan man was arrested for allegedly planning to bomb the headquarters and charged with possession of bombs with unlawful intent, according to The Globe.
In February 2023, law enforcement temporarily blocked off the area around the Satanic Temple for most of the day while it responded to a bomb threat later deemed to be a hoax.
In 2022, Daniel Damien Lucey told police that he traveled to Salem from Chelsea to commit a "hate crime" by setting the temple's front porch on fire, according to a police statement at the time.
Lucey was arrested at the scene and charged with arson, civil rights violations and destruction of a place of worship.
U.S. Navy veteran and former Mississippi House of Representatives candidate Michael Cassidy is facing hate crime charges for toppling a statue of Baphomet that the Satanic Temple Iowa erected near a Nativity scene in the Iowa State Capitol last December.
