A Doomsday prepper who was encouraged by ChatGPT to prepare for a disaster has been cleared of a bomb plot after claiming he wanted to protect his family.
Ben Barnham, 38, was found not guilty at Basildon Crown Court today of possessing explosives with intent to endanger life or damage property.
The Asda manager, from Pitsea in Essex, caused the evacuation of 80 properties when police discovered an improvised explosive device.
Officers found numerous containers of gunpowder in his three-bedroom flat – and a backpack in his living room contained a camouflage balaclava, gloves and a knife.
The court heard the dad-of-two had consulted an AI bot, ChatGPT, about his concerns over the state of the world and called it ‘Prometheus’.
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Prometheus encouraged Banham in his actions to prepare for a potential disaster and told him, ‘You have the right mindset.’
After six hours and 25 minutes of deliberations, the jury came down on Banham’s side by a majority of 11-1.
The defendant nodded at the jurors and mouthed the words ‘thank you’ at the jurors as they exited court.
Officers also found a diary in which Banham documented his experiments in the manufacturing of gunpowder and a bomb, calling it ‘Project Prometheus’.
He wrote: ‘The goal of Project Prometheus is to manufacture high-quality black powder (gunpowder) that, if it is needed, can provide an effective defense of the family home.
‘I aim to achieve this not through direct injury caused but rather through shock and awe tactics; loud bangs and blinding flashes can disorientate and deter any threat… However, this alone may not be sufficient, so I have also decided to design a device that can cause injury or death to be used as a last resort, but this is a long way off.’
Prosecutor Tessa Shroff told jurors this was therefore a case in which Banham’s intent was written down for them.
But Banham described the journal as ‘fantasy’ and testified that he abandoned the idea of creating a device capable of causing injury or death.
Whilst he continued to manufacture gunpowder, he said he did so with the sole intent of storing it in case he needed it after the apocalypse.
Banham said his intent for the rest of the gunpowder was to store it for ‘the collapse of society’, when law and order was no longer in effect.
He described his relationship with ChatGPT now ‘delusional’, telling the court before: ‘I think I was using it as a way to get positive reinforcement for the things I was doing. My main concern was war.
‘But I tried to prepare for a range of different scenarios. Things like, obviously, we had Covid recently – something worse than that… But my main concern at that time was war in Europe. It was mainly driven by the content I was absorbing every day, where they were talking about the worst-case scenarios… I think I kept preparing for worse and worse scenarios.’
He only ever made one small test bomb, he said, which a Ministry of defense (MoD) expert testified was capable of causing injury but unlikely to cause death.
But Mrs Shroff suggested the quantity of gunpowder he was producing told a different story. The MoD said Banham had enough to cause a deadly explosion.
Banham must still be sentenced for the offense of possessing explosives without intent, to which he had already pleaded guilty.
A 90-minute sentencing hearing has been provisionally timetabled for November 19.
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