Ahmed Mohamed’s Hoax Bomb Updates (No. He didn’t “invent” it)

by Scott Creighton

Yes. It was a hoax bomb and no, he did not “invent” it. He simply busted a digital clock and screwed the components into a pencil box.

There have been a few new developments in the Ahmed Mohamed hoax bomb story. Thanks to the readers here who have left comments on my earlier article linking us to some of these updates.

1. The largest Muslim organization in Texas does not fault the school nor the police department for their handling of this situation. They say what they did was perfectly understandable.

“We’re not pointing a finger at the school district or the police department,” Hamideh said. “Under the current climate that exists in this country, you can’t really blame them because when they see something like that (the pencil box “clock”), they have to react.” AP

2. Ahmed was conscience of the fact that the pencil box “clock” might look “suspicious” when he made it.

I refer back again to this YouTube video interview with Ahmed. He explains that he closed up the box with a piece of cord because he didn’t want it to look suspicious. I’m curious, why would “looking suspicious” have even crossed his mind before this whole event unfolded, if he was truly showing off a hobby project, something so innocuous as an alarm clock. Why did he choose a pencil box, one that looks like a miniature briefcase no less, as an enclosure for a clock? It’s awful hard to see the clock with the case closed. On the other hand, with the case open, it’s awful dangerous to have an exposed power transformer sitting near the snooze button (unless, perhaps his invention was to stop serial-snooze-button pressers by giving them a dangerous electrical shock!) Art Voice

Which looks more suspicious?

This…

or this? (the following image is a high def version of the original. You can click on the image for a larger view then zoom in on it)

And why would he say he thought a clasp on a pencil box would make it look suspicious? He’s a 14-year-old kid in school. That’s what pencil boxes are for… 14-year-old kids taking them to school.

3. It would appear that all the “inventor” did was bust up a digital clock and screw it’s parts into a pencil box he then later modified to make it look “less suspicious”

There is a great work-up on this hoax done by an engineer over at Art Voice which one of the readers here linked us to in the comment section of my earlier article. This engineer makes it clear that Ahmed didn’t “invent” anything and in fact, he didn’t even make a clock.. he just busted one apart and stuck the pieces in the pencil box. He actually found the exact clock that Ahmed busted apart to make his hoax bomb.

“I found the highest resolution photograph of the clock I could. Instantly, I was disappointed. Somewhere in all of this – there has indeed been a hoax. Ahmed Mohamed didn’t invent his own alarm clock. He didn’t even build a clock.”

“The shape and design is a dead give away. The large screen. The buttons on the front laid out horizontally would have been on a separate board – a large snooze button, four control buttons, and two switches to turn the alarm on and off, and choose two brightness levels. A second board inside would have contained the actual “brains” of the unit. The clock features a 9v battery back-up, and a switch on the rear allows the owner to choose between 12 and 24 hour time. (Features like a battery back-up, and a 24 hour time selection seems awful superfluous for a hobby project, don’t you think?) Oh, and about that “M” logo on the circuit board mentioned above? Micronta.”

“So there you have it folks, Ahmed Mohamad did not invent, nor build a clock. He took apart an existing clock, and transplanted the guts into a pencil box, and claimed it was his own creation. It all seems really fishy to me.” Anthony at Art Voice

Anthony posted a great break-down of this hoax. He found the clock, showed how the circuit board came from Micronta and explained what a fraud this kid’s “invention” really was. That leads him to come to a couple of reasonable questions:

“Because, is it possible, that maybe, just maybe, this was actually a hoax bomb? A silly prank that was taken the wrong way? That the media then ran with, and everyone else got carried away? Maybe there wasn’t even any racial or religious bias on the parts of the teachers and police.”

4. Ahmed’s neoliberal father who wishes to be the puppet leader of Sudan after Obama forces a regime change on them, wants his son to quit going to public schools because he blames them for what happened. Instead, he want’s his kid to go to a charter school or a private school somewhere.

5. And wouldn’t you know it? There’s a crowd-sourced fund-raising campaign underway for Ahmed and his future college fund. They say they are looking to collect $100,000 so he can take all his “inventor” talents to college. Odd thing is, the campaign matures in less than 30 days which means he will get to grab all that money before Halloween. So far they have only raised $12,500 for him which should be more than enough considering the fact that MIT will probably put him on a full scholarship for breaking apart a digital clock.