The manager of a Valero gas station in Loch Sheldrake, N.Y., was indicted this week for allegedly plotting to blow up a rival Mobil station, the Times Herald-Record in New York reported.
The newspaper said a Sullivan County grand jury indicted the manager – Manhar Patel, 34, of Fallsburg, N.Y. – for trying to hire someone to blow up a rival gas station located about a mile away.
The newspaper said Patel has been accused of paying someone $100 to put a lighted cloth into the rival gas station’s underground storage tank. The two sites have been engaged in a long-running price war on fuel.
Patel reportedly hatched the plan in May, and also made statements to an informant, the newspaper said.
“He said when he hears an explosion, he’ll know the job is done,” Sullivan County Assistant District Attorney Joey Drillings told the newspaper. Patel is also wanted in Florida and is on probation for a felony theft charge in which he’s required to repay $60,000.