Padilla: Not Exactly a Nuclear Physicist

Jacob Sullum | September 11, 2006

A New York Times story about the interrogation of Al Qaeda "personnel director and hotelier" Abu Zubaydah mentions everyone's favorite "dirty bomber," Jose Padilla, whose trial in federal court, which follows three-and-a-half years of detention by the Pentagon, is scheduled to begin in January:

Zubaydah dismissed Mr. Padilla as a maladroit extremist whose hope to construct a dirty bomb, using conventional explosives to disperse radioactive materials, was far-fetched. He told his questioners that Mr. Padilla was ignorant on the subject of nuclear physics and believed he could separate plutonium from nuclear material by rapidly swinging over his head a bucket filled with fissionable material.

The Justice Department left the dirty bomb plot out of its indictment.