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A Caltech graduate student was convicted Friday of firebombing sport utility vehicles at a Hummer dealership last year to protest the American auto industry's contribution to environmental pollution. After deliberating less than a day, a federal court jury found William Jensen Cottrell, a 24-year-old doctoral candidate in physics, guilty of seven counts of arson and one count of conspiracy .. Cottrell [and accomplices] are blamed for causing nearly $5 million in property damage during a nighttime escapade in which about 125 vehicles and a building were damaged or destroyed at four auto dealerships in the San Gabriel Valley. The case attracted wide attention after the Earth Liberation Front, a loose association of militant environmentalists, claimed responsibility.