Story Archive

Slick, Willie

Phillip Martin Olson, 61, of Fairbanks, Alaska, pulled off the largest sabotage on the trans-Alaska oil pipeline on Valentine’s Day in 1978. The bombing severed the pipeline several months after it went into operation, spilling 12,000 to 14,000 barrels of crude oil — about 588,000 gallons — across four acres of snow-covered tundra. Olson admitted the crime, knowing that the statute of limitations had expired and he couldn’t be prosecuted. The FBI interviewed him after hearing he claimed responsibility, and “Olson described in detail how he had planned and prepared to attack the pipeline with an explosive device and explained exactly how he had ... carried out the actual bombing,” a new federal indictment reads. No, Olson can’t be prosecuted for the bombing, but the FBI says he lied to agents when he falsely accused someone else of helping him, which is a felony. He faces five years in prison and a $350,000 fine. (RC/Anchorage Daily News, Fairbanks News-Miner) ...Now and then it’s an advantage that the law is so complex one needs a graduate degree to understand it.
Story Update: Olson was found not guilty of lying to the FBI.
Original Publication Date: 15 June 2014
This story is in True’s book collections, in Volume 20.

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