Who Was the Austin Bomber Mark Anthony Conditt and What Was His Motive?
(ZHE) — Police have identified the Austin bombing suspect as 24-year-old Mark Anthony Conditt.
Metro also pointed out that a Reddit user with the screenname Austinbomber was suspended from the site last night after publishing a post purporting to explain the bomber’s motive.
According to the post, the bomber didn’t plan the bombings because he wanted to kill people, but instead did it because he “wanted to watch the world burn.”
Police said they’re looking into the account, but haven’t commented on whether it has any link to the bombings.
In surveillance footage released earlier, Conditt appears wearing a blonde wig. According to the Washington Post, police said Conditt is 24 years old, while some public records suggested that he is 23.
Austin Mayor Steve Adler said his city is now breathing a sigh of relief after multiple days of terror.
“They are confident that they have someone who has been responsible for these bombs going off,” he said on the “Today” show. “As a community we’re just really relieved and just incredibly thankful for this army of law enforcement that has been in our community here for the last week or so.”
Meanwhile Austin Police Chief Brian Manley said police are still searching for a motive, and haven’t ruled out the possibility that Conditt had accomplices, the New York Times reported.
“We do not understand what motivated him to do what he did,” Manley said.
Police tracked Conditt to a hotel in Round Rock, Texas – a town about 18 miles North of Austin. After discovering him in his vehicle outside the hotel, police moved in after SWAT team reinforcements had arrived.
The New York Post reported that Conditt lived with two roommates in a suburb of the city. Pflugerville Mayor Victor Gonzales said Conditt lived in his city, about 17 miles northeast of Austin. Police are searching the house they shared for evidence.
One Pflugerville resident said he was jogging Tuesday night when he was stopped by police and asked about the bombings. He said police flew drones over a home in his neighborhood for about six hours between Tuesday evening and early Wednesday morning. He described it as a “weird house” where people were “coming and going” constantly. He added that the home is “a bit rundown.”
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Update: President Donald Trump has tweeted his congratulations to law enforcement and all involved in stopping the bomber.
AUSTIN BOMBING SUSPECT IS DEAD. Great job by law enforcement and all concerned!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 21, 2018
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The Austin serial bomber suspected of delivering six homemade bombs to locations around Austin this month, killing two people, has died after blowing himself up. Less than an hour after CBS Austin released photographs of the suspect at a Fed-X facility, media reported of an officer-involved shooting on I-35 in Round Rock.
Police have identified the dead suspected bomber as a 24-year-old white male, according to the Associated Press.
BREAKING: APD sources tell us that the #AustinBombings suspect is dead after this officer-involved shooting in Round Rock https://t.co/fmePDy2tkY https://t.co/FS1WMsLmHy
— CBS Austin (@cbsaustin) March 21, 2018
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As CBS Austin reported, police were closing in on the suspect when he killed himself by detonating some sort of explosive device in his car, according to CBS Austin’s source. People in the area reported hearing the explosion, the New York Times reported.
According to KVUE, the FBI and police tracked the bomber to a hotel in the Round Rock area using cell phone technology, security video, store receipts before ‘engaging him’ around 3 am on Wednesday. Then, as officers pursued the suspect a device was detonated, before a volley of gunfire.
CBS Austin reported that police pursued the bomber until he drove his car into a ditch off I-35. As officers approached, the bomber detonated a bomb in his car, killing himself and injuring an officer. CBS added that an 11-year veteran SWAT officer fired on the suspect. He has since been placed on administrative leave.
Austin Police Chief Brian Manley says the incident that led to the suspect’s death will be investigated by the Austin Police Monitor and the Texas Rangers.
The confrontation came just hours after CBS published CCTV showing images from a surveillance video from the FedEx Office store on Brodie Lane in South Austin which helped investigators zero in on the suspect.
According to the Daily Mail, the images show a man – possibly wearing a wig and gloves – delivering two packages around 7.30pm on Sunday. One of the packages subsequently exploded on a conveyor belt at a FedEx sorting facility outside of San Antonio in Schertz.
The other was intercepted at a facility near Austin airport and was later confirmed to contain a bomb.
BREAKING: ATF is with @Austin_Police and @FBISanAntonio on I-35 at the scene of the individual suspected in the #packagebombmurders pic.twitter.com/JAZssOclMI
— ATF HQ (@ATFHQ) March 21, 2018
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Authorities believe the same person is connected to the two packages that surfaced Tuesday is also responsible for the four other explosions that began on March 2nd, killing two people and injuring six.
Austin Police Department tweeted that they were working on an officer-involved shooting near the highway, but gave no further details.
HAPPENING NOW: this is I35 S in Round Rock near Old Settlers Blvd shut down after officer involved shooting FBI on scene @cbsaustin pic.twitter.com/pi0tEBhmY4
— Melanie Barden (@MelanieCBS) March 21, 2018
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I-35 is closed while a massive presence of law enforcement – including Austin Police, FBI and ATF investigators – processes the scene, which involved officers firing at the suspect. Several helicopters were seen hovering overhead.
While reports surfaced last night that police had discovered surveillance footage of what could be the bombing suspect, CNN added that police had been tracking the man for between 24-36 hours.
Police warn that, though the bomber is dead, there might be more bombs out there. Police don’t know what the bomber has been up to over the past 24 hours, and have warned the community to be vigilant.
The bomber’s motive is still unclear.
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Austin bombing suspect dead after officer-involved shooting
LIVE BREAKING NEWS: Austin bombing suspect is dead after officer-involved shooting on I-35. STORY: http://bit.ly/2u6W6O5
Posted by CBS Austin on Wednesday, March 21, 2018
By Tyler Durden / Republished with permission / Zero Hedge / Report a typo
This article was chosen for republication based on the interest of our readers. Anti-Media republishes stories from a number of other independent news sources. The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not reflect Anti-Media editorial policy.