/crime
(CNN) -- Three people have been charged in connection with pipe-bombings at a federal courthouse and a FedEx distribution center in San Diego this year, authorities said Wednesday.
The three could be sentenced to a maximum penalty of life in prison if convicted in connection with the blasts, which injured no one.
A federal grand jury Tuesday indicted Rachelle Lynette Carlock, 31; Ella Louise Sanders, 59; and Eric Reginald Robinson, 43, all of San Diego, on several charges, including use of a weapon of mass destruction and conspiracy to use such a weapon.
Three pipe bombs were detonated at the front doors of San Diego's Edward J. Schwartz Federal Courthouse at about 1:40 a.m. May 4, damaging the building's front lobby, shattering a glass door and breaking a window in a building across the street, authorities said.
The April 25 blast at the FedEx building broke glass in the building's front door and set off a security alarm, and an unexploded bomb was found in the parking lot and detonated by bomb technicians, according to the San Diego Union-Tribune.
"These were egregious and dangerous acts," said Keith Slotter, special agent in charge of the FBI's San Diego office. "The device that detonated in front of the courthouse could have inflicted serious harm to anyone in the vicinity of the blast."
The three stole pipe materials from The Home Depot and bought explosive materials to construct the bombs, federal prosecutors alleged in a news release.
William Cole, assistant U.S. attorney for the Southern District of California, refused to comment on a possible motive for the bombings, citing an ongoing investigation.
Authorities believe that on the night of the courthouse bombing, Carlock placed three bombs in a backpack and Sanders helped her conceal her identity, according to the indictment. Robinson drove Carlock to and from the courthouse, waiting in the car while she placed and detonated the bombs, prosecutors said in the news release.
Robinson was arrested Tuesday, authorities said, and was expected to appear Wednesday in federal court. Carlock, who in June was charged with eight felonies relating to the purchases of the explosive materials, also was in federal custody and will be arraigned soon, prosecutors said.
Sanders is serving time in a central California state prison. Cole said Sanders was convicted of a state charge unrelated to the federal charges, but he did not elaborate.
Officials believe Sanders eventually will be transported to San Diego to be arraigned on the federal charges, prosecutors said.
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