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Federal authorities are working to piece together the motive for the Nashville Christmas Day bombing that severely damaged dozens of downtown buildings and injured three people.
Authorities named 63-year-old Anthony Quinn Warner on Sunday as the man behind the mysterious explosion in which he was killed, but the motive remains elusive.
“We hope to get an answer. Sometimes it just isn’t possible, ”David Rausch, director of the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation, said in an interview Monday on NBC’s Today show. “The best way to find a reason is to talk to the individual. We won’t be able to do that in this case. “
In just a few days, hundreds of tips and leads have been sent to law enforcement agencies. However, so far, officials have not provided information on what possibly led Warner to trigger the explosion. According to officials, he hadn’t been on the radar before Christmas. A TBI logs report released Monday showed that Warner’s only arrest was for a marijuana-related charge in 1978.
“It appears that the intent was more destruction than death, but again, all of that remains speculation at this time as we continue our investigation with all of our partners,” Rausch added.
A few details have emerged about Warner’s life, with acquaintances describing him as a reserved homebody who has long devoted himself to his pets.
Warner grew up in the Nashville neighborhood of Antioch. He graduated from Antioch high school and later put down roots in the area, according to The Tennessean. In high school, Warner was on the golf team.
“What I can remember about him is essentially three things: easygoing, polite and I don’t like to use the term, but downright nerdy,” Charlie Bozman, who had supervised Antioch’s high school golf coach when Warner was on the team he told the newspaper. “He was a very reserved person.”
However, for the past month, Warner “seemed to put his affairs in order,” the newspaper reported. In late November, Warner transferred ownership of his old home to a Los Angeles woman. He did so with a “deed of resignation,” which means that the transfer did not require his signature.
Steve Fridrich, owner of Fridrich & Clark Realty, told the newspaper that Warner resigned from providing IT services after working as a contractor for the company for about four to five years. “In December he sent us an email saying that he would no longer work for us,” Fridrich said.
Fridrich also told local TV station WSMV that federal agents had asked him if Warner had a paranoia about 5G technology. Promoted by the right-wing cult movement QAnon, among others, the conspiracy theory makes wild claims about 5G.
Officials have not provided information on why Warner selected the particular location for the bombing, which damaged an AT&T building and continued to wreak havoc on cell phone service and police and hospital communications in several southern states while 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. That said investigators were examining Warner’s fingerprint and financial history, as well as a recent transfer of deed to a suburban Nashville home that they recorded.
The official, who was not authorized to discuss an ongoing investigation and spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity, said federal agents were examining a number of potential leads and pursuing various theories, including the possibility that the AT&T building was attacked.
Korneski said Sunday that officials were looking at each and every motive and were interviewing Warner acquaintances to try to determine what might have motivated him.
The bombing took place on a festive morning long before the downtown streets were full of activity and was accompanied by a recorded announcement warning everyone nearby that a bomb would soon detonate. Then, for reasons that may never be known, the audio switched to a recording of Petula Clark’s 1964 hit “Downtown” shortly before the explosion.
Police were responding to a report of gunfire on Friday when they came across the RV sounding a recorded warning that a bomb would detonate in 15 minutes. Suddenly, the warning stopped and Downtown began to sound.
The RV exploded shortly after, sending black smoke and flames from the heart of downtown Nashville’s tourist scene, an area filled with restaurants, shops and restaurants.
Early Sunday, responding officers provided heartbreaking details, sometimes choking on reliving the moments that led to the explosion.
“This will unite us forever, for the rest of my life,” Metro Nashville Police Officer James Wells, who suffered some hearing loss from the blast, told reporters at a news conference. “Christmas will never be the same again.”
