DOCUMENT: Crime

Secret Service Busts Teen. Again.

19-year-old threatened Bush's life, created phony Secret Service IDs

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Secret Service Busts Teen. Again.

MAY 19--A teenager who was charged last year with threatening the lives of President George W. Bush and other federal officials has again been arrested, this time for manufacturing bogus U.S Secret Service credentials. Acting on an anonymous telephone tip, federal agents yesterday arrested Peter Bonfiglio, 19, at the New York City residence he shares with his grandparents. According to a federal criminal complaint, a copy of which you can find below, Bonfiglio admitted to manufacturing and selling the Secret Service IDs and even showed agents the computer and printer he was using to produce the fakes. As noted in the complaint, the counterfeit credentials bore the name of a Secret Service agent involved in the first federal action filed against Bonfiglio. In that case, the teenager, then residing in Florida, allegedly made repeated telephone and written threats on Bush's life and warned that he would bomb federal buildings in Sarasota. In a June 2005 arrest affidavit, Secret Service agent Don Herrington reported that Bonfiglio left him a voicemail message stating, 'he was going to kill the President, blow up my building, and that I was expected to pay and die.' The credentials recently created by Bonfiglio, who is pictured in the above mug shot, carried Herrington's name (though it was slightly misspelled). While Bonfiglio's lawyer argued that the teen was unstable, a federal judge in Tampa found him competent to stand trial for threatening Bush. However, prosecutors filed a motion to dismiss the felony count in December, noting that Bonfiglio had been 'involuntarily committed to the custody of the State of Florida.' It is unclear how long Bonfiglio was a ward of the Sunshine State or when he relocated north. At a U.S. District Court appearance yesterday, Magistrate Roanne Mann released Bonfiglio on $10,000 bond, ordered him to reside with his grandparents in Queens, and restricted his travel to New York City and Long Island. (6 pages)