Bomber of Pae Street sentenced

TALLINN- The Tallinn court has sentenced70-year-old defendant Mart Ringmaa on charges of staging 11 explosions in theEstonian capital in which seven people lost their lives sentenced to 15 yearsin prison.

The Harju Country Court found Ringmaa's guilt to be provenonly in two instances and acquitted him in nine cases of the indictment.

Public Prosecutor MargusKurm had wanted Ringmaa to be jailed for life.

Kurm considered Ringmaa'sguilt to be proven in all episodes of carrying out of explosions and making ofexplosive devices. The prosecutor said he was seeking a life sentence becausethe explosions represented the crime series that has claimed the biggest numberof victims in Estonian history.

Ringmaa, in his last words,said that the evidence cited in the indictment does not allow the court toconvict him. Ringmaa said he had made a confession of fraud, which he committedin submitting false data to the pension authority, but had never manufacturedor handled an explosive device.

According to theindictment, Ringmaa staged 11 explosions over the years 1998-2005, in whichseven people were killed and six injured. The explosions caused damage worthmore than seven million kroons, whereas two more blasts allegedly plotted byRingmaa never took place because the bombs failed to detonate.

Most of the victims of theexplosions that Ringmaa was accused of staging were on Pae Street in the eastern Tallinn neighborhood of Lasnamae wererandom people who had gone to examine a booby-trap bomb disguised by the bomberas a bag or ordinary item.