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The pipe bomber next door: Westchester man charged with menacing neighbors with blasts
By
Rhiannon Rashidi
Published Apr 1, 2026
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Courtesy Southern District of New York
By
Rhiannon Rashidi
Published Apr 1, 2026
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A Westchester County man has been charged with making pipe bombs in his apartment, after months of complaints from neighbors about loud explosions.
Raymond Elders, 65, was arrested at his apartment building early on Monday after the White Plains Police Department received multiple reports of explosions around 5:30 a.m., according to federal prosecutors.
When cops arrived at the scene, they reported smelling an acrid burning odor, according to a criminal complaint by the Southern District of New York. It says officers found a pipe bomb on the front steps of Elder's apartment complex and called in backup from FBI explosive specialists.
As authorities swept the building, Elders emerged from his apartment with black and blue stains on his hands, holding a lighter, according to the criminal complaint.
Inside his apartment, they found supplies to make explosives as well as 25 completed pipe bombs made with PVC pipe, commercial grade sulfur and other ingredients, prosecutors said.
A federal judge in White Plains ordered that Elders be held on charges of making a weapon of mass destruction.
The criminal complaint said authorities had received calls about explosions since at least June of last year.
“Over a period of months, he lit these devices and detonated them in his neighborhood in White Plains, causing unexplained explosions that his neighbors repeatedly reported to the police. It should go without saying that anyone who tosses illegal explosives onto New York residential streets should expect to face serious consequences,” Manhattan U.S. Attorney Jay Clayton said.
Neighbor Bryant Paucar, 22, recalled police had responded to calls about an explosion earlier in the month. He said police had attributed it to an electrical problem.
“We told them it didn’t really seem like [the electrical grid]. It seemed like something worse,” said Paucar, who felt the police were too dismissive of residents’ concerns.
White Plains Police Commissioner Wade Hardy said in a brief interview that officers’ response to the earlier incidents was under review.
Paucar said even after the past complaints, he was stunned by Elder’s arrest.
“A lot of people are really shocked because we didn’t think something like that would be happening around the corner,” Paucar said.
Elders’ attorney did not respond to an inquiry. Prosecutors wrote that surveillance footage from the apartment building captured a person who looked like Elders throwing a smoking explosive device into the street in front of his building in broad daylight on March 18.
The suspect was allegedly caught on camera throwing another bomb just hours before his arrest.
Elders denied manufacturing or detonating pipe bombs near his apartment while being questioned, according to the complaint. But it says he admitted to building a bomb as a teenager.
“Elders claimed that he had constructed an explosive from an aluminum canister filled with shotgun shells,” prosecutors wrote.
Pacuar said he was looking forward to a good night's sleep.
“It makes me feel pretty fine to be honest,” Paucar said. “I don’t have to worry about waking up randomly in the night from an explosion.”
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