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Judge orders medication for man in Oklahoma pipe bomb case

Posted at 1:12 PM, Feb 13, 2018
and last updated 2018-02-13 15:46:50-05

TULSA, Okla. (AP) -- A judge in Oklahoma has ruled that a former senior airman suspected of setting off a pipe bomb outside an Air Force recruiting office will be forced to take medication to restore his competency to stand trial on explosives charges.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Frank McCarthy ordered Tuesday that anti-psychotic drugs be given to 29-year-old Benjamin Roden. Whitney Mauldin, Roden's attorney, says Roden likely will be injected with the drugs if he refuses to take the medication.

McCarthy previously determined Roden wasn't competent to stand trial for the July 10 explosion in the Tulsa suburb of Bixby. No one was hurt.

Prosecutor Allen Litchfield says Roden refused to leave his cell to appear at Tuesday's video conference hearing from the North Carolina federal medical facility where he's being treated.

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