A Brooklyn man was hit with federal arson charges Thursday for allegedly hurling “an explosive device” into a Verizon work van during a wild road rage beef, prosecutors said.
Kevindale Nurse, who was arrested Thursday morning, is accused in an indictment unsealed in Brooklyn federal court of losing his head on Jan. 31 when he allegedly torched the van and injured two Verizon workers — all while his 4-year-old son was in his vehicle with him, prosecutors said in a press release.
“The defendant committed an unconscionable act by using explosives during a road rage incident, disregarding potentially deadly consequences when he threw an explosive device into a neighboring vehicle,” Bryan Miller, a special agent with ATF, said in a statement.
According to the US Attorney’s Office in the Eastern District of New York, Nurse, 36, was “erratically” driving a white “dollar van” in Crown Heights when he cut off the Verizon vehicle.
With his young son in the minivan witnessing his dad blowing his cool, Nurse allegedly pulled up next to the work van at President Street and Brooklyn Avenue and “threw an explosive device into the driver’s side window of the Verizon van,” prosecutors said.
The explosive device was described by witnesses as a “firework,” according to court documents.
The firework exploded inside the van, with the two repairmen suffering “multiple injuries,” including tinnitus and neck and back pain. Thee vehicle was also “extensively damaged by the blast.”
Nurse, who was nabbed by the NYPD, was indicted by a federal grand jury on Tuesday, the feds said.
“There is no place in civil society for the spreading of fear through intimidation, violence and destruction,” NYPD Police Commissioner Edward Caban said in a statement.
He faces up to 40 years in prison if convicted.
A spokesman for the US Attorney’s Office in Brooklyn said prosecutors will ask a judge that Nurse be held without bail.
