Man, 26, convicted for role in Phelps pipe-bomb incident

Kent Bradley Lindstrom expected to be sentenced to probation.

Kent Bradley Lindstrom was convicted Monday of felony criminal damage to property in connection with the explosion in August of a pipe bomb outside the family home of Brent Roper and Shirley Phelps-Roper.

The maximum penalties for the conviction are a prison sentence of seven months and a $10,000 fine. However, Lindstrom, who doesn’t have a criminal record, faces presumptive probation.

Lindstrom, 26, 2045 S.W. MacVicar, pleaded no contest Monday to the criminal damage to property charge, a class E felony, as part of a plea arrangement with the Shawnee County district attorney’s office. Before the plea, Lindstrom was charged with felony arson and property loss under $25,000. Monday was to have been the preliminary hearing on the charge.

Lindstrom remained free Monday on a $2,500 bond, said Judge Eric Rosen, who emphasized a bond condition barring Lindstrom from having contact with the Phelps-Roper family.

During the hearing, First Assistant District Attorney Joel Meinecke described the bomb as an “explosive device” made of a 4- to 6-inch length of PVC pipe 1 inch around that was detonated by a fuse. The type of explosive wasn’t disclosed.

On Aug. 20, Lindstrom was in a car with two other men when the fuse was lit and the pipe bomb was thrown near the Phelps-Roper home in southwest Topeka, where it exploded. The explosion caused an estimated $1,000 damage to a 1993 van and about $150 damage to a fence. Eight children were in the Phelps-Roper home, but no one was injured by the blast.

The three men in the Lindstrom car and two men who watched the explosion from a second vehicle returned to a home of one of the men, where they talked and laughed about the incident, Meinecke said.

Phelps-Roper is a daughter of the Rev. Fred W. Phelps Sr., pastor of the Westboro Baptist Church, which is known for its strident anti-homosexual picketing. Phelps-Roper, a picketer, is a member of the Phelps Chartered law office.

Lindstrom is to be sentenced March 22 by Judge Franklin Theis.