OCALA, Fla. – The man accused of plotting to set off explosives inside Target stores in hopes of driving down the company's stock price had recently started learning the financial markets, records obtained by News 6 show.
Federal authorities arrested Mark Charles Barnett, 49, on Monday after a learning that Barnett had allegedly built bombs and placed them inside boxes of breakfast bars, pasta and stuffing mix.
Barnett was going to pay an accomplice to plant the booby-trapped groceries in Target stores throughout the eastern United States, prosecutors said.
That accomplice notified law enforcement officials about Barnett's alleged plans.
Barnett is currently on probation for a 1992 kidnapping in Pinellas County, records show.
In a written report submitted to his probation officer in January, Barnett said his personal goal was "learning financial markets."
Barnett recently opened a trade account and had started investing, the probation report states.
According to prosecutors, Barnett was going to bomb Target stores in hopes that the company's stock price would drop. He then planned to purchase Target shares under the belief the price would eventually rebound, authorities said.
In April 1992, Barnett and a fellow transient, Duane Anderson, carjacked an 18-year-old woman and repeatedly raped her, according to a report published in the St. Petersburg Times.
Less than a month later, the two men forcibly abducted a 29-year-old mathematics professor from a South Carolina laundromat, court records show.
As Barnett drove toward Alabama, Anderson raped the victim in the rear seat of her car, prosecutors said.
During the trip, Barnett and Anderson threatened to kill the woman and told her they'd burn her body and her car, reports indicate.
While the two kidnappers and their victim spent the night in an Alabama motel room, prosecutors said the woman used the wrapper from the bar of soap to spell out the word "HELP" on the wall of the bathroom in hopes someone would rescue her.
The next day, when Barnett and Anderson stopped for food, the woman escaped, records show.
Both men were sentenced to federal prison for the South Carolina kidnapping.
Anderson is currently serving a life prison sentence for the Pinellas County kidnapping and rape.
Barnett was released from state custody in February 2013 and at the time of his arrest was under supervised probation by the Florida Department of Corrections. He is also registered as a sex offender in Florida.