About ten years ago a student studying at the "Energetic Materials Research and Testing Center" at the local university got injured when one of explosive devices he was making went off prematurely in in his hand.

http://www.emrtc.nmt.edu/

The problem was that he claimed he was making the stuff for a class project - in his apartment. There was a big local fuss as the bomb squad cleared the apartment complex for most of the night as they hauled away a massive amount of explosive materials.

The student must have been working on something important for the Feds. He got off with a slap on the wrist and went on with his research.

My guess is that something similar is going on, and will happen, with this guy.