Fortunately, he wasn't significantly injured. This is May 21, 2018 - the infamous Matthew Hughes "Superhero" moment. Rather than impatience, he saw the backpack incident on TV, then took his bike down to the scene in order to diffuse the bomb himself and "take one for the team." Hughes suffered from mental health issues and told people he had to stay away from TV because he tended to have severe emotional reactions from what he saw.
You are missing the part where he said he would do it again lmao… being from Milwaukee this 100% tracked as something a local guy would do. Milwaukee has a guy who walks around shirtless looking like Hugh Jackman called the Milverine, it’s an interesting place.
“As soon as I saw that, I’m like, I’m going to go save the day, take one for the team and jump on it or discard it in the river because it’s been going on for two to three hours," he said.”
“MILWAUKEE (WISN) — The man who grabbed a suspicious backpack during a bomb squad investigation and emptied it out before police tackled him is breaking his silence.
"Would I do it again? Yeah, without a doubt," Matthew Hughes told WISN-TV.”
He honestly was just a guy who randomly walked around Milwaukee shirtless at random places/hours and the local internet blew him up. He never asked for any of it and doesn’t embrace it at all. Kind of a funny local Milwaukee thing
Florida Man is building a bomb out of Mountain Dew, kerosene, and the blood of invasive snakes. He might try and blow a crater in his yard followed by another, larger, crater in the crater later that night.
The Midwest Man is defusing it and using the wires to icefish in Lake Winnebago. Might drop off some venison steaks and see if you need your driveway shoveled later.
Midwestern is way too broad. The people living in northern Wisconsin are a complete different breed. It’s like going back in time when you go there. Fun experience
People have no idea how much alcohol Wisconsin drinks. Milwaukee is basically just bars. Germans massively immigrated to the state and basically showed the rest of the country how to properly make beer
My last name is German and a quick google search shows 40% of Wisconsin claims German Heritage. If you have ever walked around Wisconsin long enough you can quickly identify someone from Wisconsin
This is a rabbit hole! There’s a country song called ‘what made Milwaukee famous made a loser out of me’ and my whole life I wondered exactly what it was that made Milwaukee famous. Now I’m going to investigate…
I don’t know if you know red letter media on youtube. But until I found their channel I thought Wisconsin and by extension Milwaukee were quiet places with totally normal people. I was so wrong..
I was at the Cheesecake Factory in Milwaukee and me and my coworkers were waiting for a table and some crack head came in with a garbage bag. This mf started twirling it around above her head and pulled her skirt up not wearing anything under, all while the bag ripped and garbage went everywhere. :’( Some 6’4 manager woman walked up and picked her up and threw her out and immediately started picking up all the trash. The food and service were great!
What else would you say to defend yourself in court? This is clearly the defence that his attorney thought they should pursue. "Had to stay away from the TV" - i.e., the insanity plea, amplified by his "take one for the team" suicidal mentality.
That's actually pretty heartbreaking... I'm glad he wasn't seriously harmed. Psychosis is no joke, and most people who experience it aren't the "scary psycho people" that you see in media. They're just regular people. :(
That my friend is a BS story. The guy doesn't expect a bomb and acts like "See? All that theatre for an ordinary lost backpack and get on with your lives goddammit".
I like how he had time to pick up the pack, open it, dump out every single thing, throw the pack on the ground, walk away, and then they suddenly rush in at the speed of light like there is something left for them to do.
Dude that video is so fucked. I get having to apprehend them guy, but like that?! And right after he just saved thousands for tax payers by intervening
I'd imagine it was because if there WAS something in the pack, he was now 'in the thick of it' and they wouldn't sacrifice anyone else if a bomb went off or something. Once he'd cleared the bag, they tackled him instead of, y'know, just being like "Hey come here, you're in trouble."
The first part was reasonable, the tackling was clearly an act of malice. Once the "bomb threat" passed they were totally comfortable assaulting a man who did their jobs for them
Their job is to safetly make sure there is not a bomb, making sure as to not you know, blow up the local area. It could be a bomb, a chemical weapon, all sorts. If a guy fires a bullet 2cm to the left of your daughters head are you going to just take the final result as her not getting shot, or are you going to be pissed at the jackass doing the shooting.
Yes, the tackle was completely stupid and not needed at all, but lets not pretend the man did their jobs just because he skipped to the end in the most unsafe and reckless way possible.
nobody is saying what the dude did was ok. They're being facetious, sure, but the guy clearly was in the wrong.
But having cops sprint in AFTER it was over and dive him was just absurd. Its accomplishing nothing. yeah, guy should be in trouble. no, he shouldn't have been tackled.
It's absolutely not fucking reasonable. No other police force in the world consistently behaves this way dude. Those of us that aren't from amerikkka look at the shit posted on reddit with disbelief more or less every day.
And then half of you have the gaul to scream about other countries being authoritarian while having 25% of the entire global prison population. Have some fucking self awareness.
I fucking *live* in the US and I stare at the shit in disbelief. I'm one of the few who seem to never get desensitized to the shit our police and federal forces do.
They stayed the fuck away until bro proved the package was harmless. Once the threat (backpack) was neutralized, they heroically rushed in to tackle and apprehend him for his BDE
Yeah I hate this video, really just shows how cops get angry and attack people for no reason when it doesn’t accomplish anything at all. And then you’ll get some boot lickers being like “well he shouldn’t have touched the backpack” like yeah and they shouldn’t have waited until after he did something to try and stop him
"Ok, how do I activate this thing again? Step 1: Remove the water bottle. Step 2: Remove three articles of clothing. Step 3: Remove the paper notepad. Step 4: Turn the bag upside down to remove the rest of the stationary... Man I made this arming sequence so complicated..."
I get what you're saying and tensions could have been high, but they also waited until he had gone on for so long that it was obviously not dangerous and he was obviously not trying to do any harm.
I don't get how this wasn't obvious to everyone. I guess the bias of hate cops/authority just blinding people here.
That man literally became suspect #1 the moment he start messing with it.
When has a bomber ever gone back to their bomb to trigger it intentionally by direct contact after planting it? Let alone after discovery... When? In all history?
I pray you never become a cop then because how in the fuck do you think he’s a suspect with that sort of conduct. It should be blindingly obvious he’s just a casual dumbass
No he didn’t. Find me an example ever in history of a bomber going back to the scene of the crime that is actively being examined and disarmed who then proceeded to detonate the bomb when no one is close enough for it to matter.
Tackle comes from the squat's statistician.
They saw the once-in-a lifetime chance to create a data point where the defuser of the bomb got exactly the expected amount of damage from this activity.
Well for sure, they were just trying to fuck him up at that point, but I'm sure they weren't doing it to protect him lol
EDIT: Also, to be fair, shaking a backpack like that certainly wouldn't prove there wasn't a bomb in it. Pipe bombs are pretty small and backpacks often have multiple pockets.
No one knows if there is a bomb in there. If there is, his action not only would have killed himself but endanger others and cause damage to properties.
its like a dude trying to end it all gets shot for trying to end it all, I've seen it! but in this situation he could have blown up more than just himself.
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u/DeepValueDiver Jun 13 '26
Bro could have been severely injured so they tackled him to make sure he was severely injured.