What we know about Christmas Day bomber in Nashville
NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Anthony Quinn Warner was the bomber in the explosion that rocked downtown Nashville on Christmas Day and he died in the blast, authorities mentioned Sunday.
Warner, 63, was a longtime Nashvillian who held a number of IT jobs.
Public data present he had intensive expertise with electronics and alarm techniques. He labored as an unbiased pc technician with the actual property agency Fridrich & Clark.
Warner, who was beforehand named as an individual of curiosity in the case by Nashville Police Chief John Drake, is believed to have acted alone in the incident, investigators mentioned.
“Anthony Warner is the bomber. He was present when the bomb went off, and he perished in the bombing,” U.S. Attorney Donald Cochran mentioned Sunday.
Authorities:Anthony Warner was Christmas Day ‘bomber’ in Nashville and likely died in explosion
Federal brokers searched his dwelling in Antioch, and the Fridrich & Clark actual property workplace in Nashville on Saturday.
Google Street View photographs of Warner’s dwelling present a white RV parked behind a picket fence on the property. His neighbors reported seeing the RV on the dwelling for years.
A white RV was on the heart of the blast Friday morning on Second Avenue in Nashville.
Police mentioned the explosion got here from the RV quickly after a speaker system broadcast a warning to evacuate the realm.
Police in the realm moments earlier than the blast mentioned the audio system performed the wistful 1964 music “Downtown” by Petula Clark. The lyric, about going to town to hunt refuge from unhappiness, echoed on Second Avenue earlier than the blast: “The lights are much brighter there.”
The Tennessean:Cleaning up devastation on Second Avenue will take months
Neighbor: Warner by no means talked politics; saved to himself
Steve Schmoldt and his spouse have lived subsequent to Warner for greater than twenty years.
Schmoldt described his longtime neighbor as pleasant, somebody with whom he made transient small speak.
He mentioned Warner was “kind of low key to the point of, I don’t know, I guess some people would say he’s a little odd.”
“You never saw anyone come and go,” Schmoldt mentioned of Warner’s dwelling. “Never saw him go anywhere. As far as we knew, he was kind of a computer geek that worked at home.”
Warner positioned lights and safety cameras outdoors his home.
Warner did a number of work in his yard. Schmoldt mentioned Warner constructed the fence round his yard himself.
The neighbors by no means talked about politics or faith. Warner by no means gave any indication of any carefully held ideology.
“I can tell you as far as politics, he never had any yard signs or flags in his window or anything like that. If he did have any political beliefs he kept, that was something he kept to himself,” Schmoldt said.
Schmoldt said that after the RV had been parked outside the home for years, a couple of weeks ago, Warner built a gate in the fence and drove the RV into his yard.
“To be honest, we didn’t really pay any attention it was gone until the FBI and ATF showed up,” Schmoldt mentioned.
He and his wife watched the news Christmas morning as information began to unfold about the Second Avenue bombing. They saw the photos police released of the RV that exploded.
It didn’t click that their neighbor might be connected until Saturday, when they saw a large group of law enforcement officers outside Warner’s home.
“Holy cow, there’s a SWAT team out there,” Schmoldt recalled his wife saying as she looked out the front door midmorning Saturday.
Court data present a quitclaim deed switch of Warner’s residence from Warner to a person with a Los Angeles handle on Nov. 25 for $0.
Warner owned electronics and alarm company
State business records show Warner registered the company Custom Alarms & Electronics, which specialized in producing burglar alarms. The company had an alarm license from November 1993 through November 1998.
Court records show Warner was enmeshed in a family dispute when he transferred ownership of a second family home to himself about one month before his brother died in 2018.
His mother filed a petition in February 2019 asking a judge to overturn the real estate transfer, arguing that Warner, who was his brother’s power of attorney, acted in self-interest in the property transfer since it resulted in personal financial gain.
The case was dismissed in October 2019 at the mother’s request. Attorney Yancy Belcher said the family asked the mother not to speak to the media.
The Warner family has been in Nashville at least since 1961, according to newspaper archives. Anthony Warner, who went by the name Tony, was pictured in the Antioch High School during his sophomore and junior years in 1973 and 1974.
Contributing: Jay Cannon, USA TODAY
Follow reporters Mariah Timms, Brinley Hineman, Natalie Neysa Alund and Adam Tamburin on Twitter: @MariahTimms, @brinleyhineman, @nataliealund, @tamburintweets.
