Harvey's Resort Hotel bombing

John Birges Sr. (born János Birgés, 1922) was a Hungarian immigrant to the US, settling in Clovis, California. He claimed to later biographers he flew for the Luftwaffe during World War II, during which time he provided intelligence to the United States. He was captured and sentenced to 25 years of hard labor in a Siberian gulag. In 1956, eight years into his sentence in the gulag, he was released during a period of mass repatriation of POWs held in the Soviet Union to their home countries and returned to Hungary. From there, he emigrated to the United States in 1957. Birges built a successful landscaping business, but his addiction to gambling led to him losing a large amount of money and prompted the bomb plot. His gambling debt and experience with explosives were primary pieces of evidence linking him to the bombing. ==Bombing==

As the mastermind behind the bomb, Birges was attempting to extort $3 million from the casino, claiming he had lost $750,000 gambling there. The bomb was delivered to the casino's second floor by two men posing as technicians; witnesses spotted a white van marked with "IBM" on the side. The bomb, one of the largest the FBI had ever seen, was loaded with an estimated of dynamite stolen from a construction site in Fresno, California. After studying the bomb for more than a day through X-rays, bomb technicians decided that, although there were warnings from the bomb maker that a shock would trigger the device, the best hope of disarming it was by separating the detonators from the dynamite. The technicians thought this could be accomplished using a shaped charge of C-4. The attempt to disarm the bomb failed as the technicians did not know a second power source was present in the bottom box. The bomb destroyed much of the hotel, although no one was injured. The explosion also damaged Harrah's Casino (connected to Harvey's Resort via a tunnel), breaking many of its windows. The bomb caused an estimated $18 million in total damages. Parts of Harvey's casino reopened within 48 hours, and the fully repaired and renovated hotel reopened in May 1981. ==Investigation==

According to FBI experts, the Harvey's bomb remains the most complex improvised explosive device they have examined, and a replica of "the machine", as the extortionists called it, was still used in FBI training . Birges was investigated as a possible suspect due to his white van being identified as being in nearby South Lake Tahoe at the time of the bombing. Birges was eventually arrested based on a tip. One of his sons had revealed to his then-girlfriend that his father had placed a bomb in Harvey's. After the two broke up, she was on a date with another man when they heard about a reward for information, and she informed her new boyfriend about Birges. This man then called the FBI. ==Pleas and convictions==

John Birges' two sons both entered pleas of guilty in 1981 for their roles in the bombing, serving no prison time in exchange for testifying against their father. Birges was convicted in 1982 and sentenced to life in prison without parole. and Hall's father-in-law Willis "Bill" Brown, who entered a plea of guilty in exchange for a sentence of seven years in prison. In 1984, Williams' initial conviction was overturned on appeal. In May 1985, Williams pled guilty to being an accessory in the extortion-bombing and received a recommendation for parole from prosecutors. ==References==