In his first "lucid" discussion with his lawyer, Edward Leary denied involvement in a subway firebombing and said he would be willing to take a lie detector test, the attorney said Friday.
In a five-minute conversation before he was wheeled to an operating room Wednesday, Leary denied that he had carried the bomb or even a glass jar on the train when the fire erupted Dec. 21, said Leary's lawyer, Stephen Murphy. He also denied plotting extortion or writing extortion notes."I told him, `Please don't have me go down there and say this if you did it.' He said he didn't do it," said Murphy.
Forty-eight people were hurt when a homemade firebomb went off inside a subway car in Lower Manhattan. Leary, an unemployed computer expert, suffered third-degree burns over 40 percent of his body and remains in critical condition Friday.