A male resident of Washington state, associated with a bombing incident that led to huge destruction at a fertility clinic in Palm Springs, Southern California, lost his life while under federal custody on Tuesday. The man, 32-year-old Daniel Park, had been indicted for assisting Guy Edward Bartkus, the chief offender who perished in the blast that occurred on May 17. Officials reported Daniel Park, whose domicile was in the suburban districts of Seattle, to be motionless in his confinement at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Los Angeles during Tuesday’s early hours. Subsequently, he was confirmed dead at a medical facility, but the exact reason behind his sudden demise was not disclosed.
Park and Bartkus had reportedly united on web platforms fostering unconventional views, largely prevalent on the internet’s outlier spaces. Their common anti-human reproduction ideals had brought them together, as asserted by the investigators in charge of the case. The explosion at the clinic in Palm Springs, situated eastwards from Los Angeles, caused widespread damage, busted windows of nearby buildings, and led to the clinic’s temporary shutdown. The law enforcement authorities categorized the assault as an act of terror.
The destruction, however, did not cause harm to any embryos present at the clinic. Prior to the incident, Park was known to have sent a consignment of ammonium nitrate, weighing about 180 pounds, to Bartkus in January. He purchased another 90 pounds of the same volatile material and had it shipped to Bartkus just a few days before the unfortunate explosion.
Investigators, upon scrutinizing the digital footprints of the transactions, found that Park made multiple purchases of ammonium nitrate from online sellers. These transactions were spread across a time frame extending from October 2022 till May 2025. The evidence is replete in a federal document that further uncovers Park’s illegal activities.
In the months before the catastrophe, Park reportedly visited Bartkus at Twentynine Palms, California, in the vicinity of Palm Springs, where they conducted several tests with explosives in Bartkus’s personal garage. Interestingly, it was documented that mere days before hosting Park in January, Bartkus was found querying a chat application driven by Artificial Intelligence about the assembly of explosives and inquiries regarding ideal proportions of diesel and gasoline for maximum blast impact.
The pair’s conversation primarily revolved around the objective to devise an explosion with optimal destructive potential. Legal authorities apprehended Park at New York’s JFK Airport on June 3. His extradition was announced from Poland, where he sought shelter following the incident, just four days post the catastrophe.
Park was slapped with the federal charge of supplying and making attempts to supply terrorists with essential resources. Post his arrest, he was accommodated at the Metropolitan Detention Center starting June 13 onward. However, the official declaration of his death was made by the Bureau of Prisons, despite the legal proceedings being directed by the Central District of California’s U.S. Attorney’s Office.
Reportedly, Park and Bartkus found common ground in ‘antinatalism,’ an unconventional belief that refutes the convention of childbirth and opposes population expansion. The belief argues against human reproduction, asserting that the perpetuation of human life should be discontinued. Bartkus’s conscious choice to target American Reproductive Centers, an establishment offering services to aid those seeking pregnancy including in-vitro fertilization and fertility assessments, aligned with their shared anti-procreation sentiments.
Operating under visible pseudonyms, Park was an active participant in a Reddit subforum dedicated to antinatalism discussions for over nine years. Previously, in the year 2016, he openly shared his intentions to recruit more like-minded individuals to his cause, referred to by him as a beacon of hope.
Court documents exhibited Park’s controversial views that put forth death as a viable alternative in times of desperation and despair. Such radical philosophy referred to as ‘pro-mortalism’, was recurrently echoed in his statements from his high school years, as per claims of Park’s family members, given during interactions with federal investigators.
Most recent digital interactions of Park traced back to March, where he expressed an aspiration to rally up fellow antinatalists residing in Washington state and its surrounding areas. In an alarming post on a forum, he expressed his desire to organize protests and arrange face-to-face events in furtherance of their cause.