Authorities' Focus Turns to Motive in Mysterious Case of Nashville Christmas Day Explosion
With federal officials having identified the man believed to be behind Nashville’s Christmas Day bombing, authorities now turn to the task of piecing together the motive behind the explosion that severely damaged dozens of downtown buildings and injured three people.
While officials on Sunday named Anthony Quinn Warner, 63, as the man behind the mysterious explosion in which he was apparently killed, the motive has remained elusive.
“These answers won’t come quickly and will still require a lot of our team’s efforts,” FBI Special Agent Doug Korneski said at a Sunday news conference. “Though we may be able to answer some these questions as our investigation continues, none of those answers will be enough by those affected by this event.”
In just a few days, hundreds of tips and leads have been submitted to law enforcement agencies. Yet thus far, officials have not provided information on what possibly drove Warner to set off the explosion.
David Rausch, the director of the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation, told reporters on Sunday that Warner had not been on the radar before Christmas.
Furthermore, officials have not provided insight into why Warner selected the particular location for the bombing, which damaged an AT&T building and continued to wreak havoc on cellphone service and police and hospital communications in several Southern states as the company worked to restore service.
Forensic analysts were reviewing evidence collected from the blast site to try to identify the components of the explosives as well as information from the U.S. Bomb Data Center for intelligence and investigative leads, according to a law enforcement official. The same official said investigators were examining Warner’s digital footprint and financial history, as well as a recent deed transfer of a suburban Nashville home they searched.
The official, who was not authorized to discuss an ongoing investigation and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity, said federal agents were examining a number of potential leads and pursuing several theories, including the possibility that the AT&T building was targeted.
At the news conference Sunday, Korneski said officials were looking at any and all motives and were interviewing acquaintances of Warner’s to try to determine what may have motivated him.
The bombing took place on Christmas morning, well before downtown streets were bustling with activity, and was accompanied by a recorded announcement warning anyone nearby that a bomb would soon detonate. Then, shortly before the blast, the audio switched to a recording of Petula Clark’s 1964 hit “Downtown.”
Warner, who public records show had experience with electronics and alarms and who had also worked as a computer consultant for a Nashville real estate firm, had been regarded as a person of interest in the bombing since at least Saturday, when federal and local investigators converged on the home linked to him.
Federal agents could be seen looking around the property, searching the home and the backyard. A Google Maps image captured in May 2019 had shown a recreational vehicle similar to the one that exploded parked in the backyard, but it was not at the property on Saturday, according to an AP reporter at the scene.
On Sunday morning, authorities formally named Warner as being under investigation.
Officials said their identification of Warner relied on several key pieces of evidence, including DNA found at the explosion site. Investigators had previously revealed that human remains had been found in the vicinity.
In addition, investigators from the Tennessee Highway Patrol recovered parts from the RV among the wreckage from the blast and were able to link the vehicle identification number to an RV that was registered to Warner, officials said.
“We’re still following leads, but right now there is no indication that any other persons were involved,” Korneski said. “We’ve reviewed hours of security video surrounding the recreation vehicle. We saw no other people involved.”
Police were responding to a report of shots fired Friday when they encountered the RV blaring a recorded warning that a bomb would detonate in 15 minutes. Suddenly the warning stopped, and “Downtown” started playing.
The RV exploded shortly afterward, sending black smoke and flames billowing from the heart of downtown Nashville’s tourist scene, an area packed with honky-tonks, restaurants and shops.
Buildings shook and windows shattered streets away from the explosion near a building owned by AT&T, one block from the company’s office tower, a landmark in downtown.
But on Sunday, just blocks from where the bombing took place, tourists had already begun to fill the sidewalks on Lower Broadway, a central entertainment district. Some took selfies while others tried to get as close as possible to the explosion site, blocked by police barricades.
Earlier Sunday, the police officers who responded provided harrowing details, at times getting choked up reliving the moments that led up to the blast.
“This is going to tie us together forever, for the rest of my life,” Metro Nashville police Officer James Wells, who suffered some hearing loss due to the explosion, told reporters at a news conference. “Christmas will never be the same.”
Officer Brenna Hosey said she and her colleagues knocked on six or seven doors in nearby apartments to warn residents to evacuate. She particularly remembered a startled mother of four children.
“I don’t have kids but I have cousins and nieces, people who I love who are small,” Hosey said, adding she had to plead with the family to leave the building as quickly as possible.
The Western Journal has reviewed this Associated Press story and may have altered it prior to publication to ensure that it meets our editorial standards.
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