Nashville blast suspect wasn’t on authorities’ radar

Federal, state and local law enforcement officers are still searching for the motive behind a bombing that rocked Nashville on Christmas morning, with no concrete clues yet emerging as to why the 63-year-old suspect carried out his suicide mission.

The FBI has identified the suspect as Anthony Q. Warner and said he died in the blast, which damaged more than 40 businesses in downtown Tennessee's largest city and the United States' country music capital.

Warner's motor home exploded at dawn on Friday, soon after police, who were responding to reports of gunfire, heard music and an automated message emanating from the vehicle warning of a bomb. Police hurried to evacuate people in the area, and Warner is the only person known to have perished.

David Rausch, director of the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation, said onmonday that Warner's mother was cooperating with the multiagency investigation but that motive remained elusive. The TBI released Warner's criminal history, showing a single marijuana charge more than four decades ago.

“He was not on our radar,” Rausch told a news briefing, explaining that the TBI was helping the FBI and the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) to interview neighbors and relatives. “We are all taking pieces of the puzzle, working to determine what the motivation was for this individual.”

The bombing took place in the early morning when there was little activity in the city. In addition to the warning, the audio onwarner's recreational vehicle played a recording of Petula Clark's 1964 hit “Downtown” before the blast.

Nashville Mayor John Cooper has said that local officials felt there had to be some connection between the bombing, which occurred near an AT&T Inc. transmission building on the city's bustling Second Avenue, and the company.