Austin bombings: Police hunt for motive as they search home of suspect Mark Anthony Conditt - as it happened
Federal officials believe that are likely no more devices in the public domain
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The suspect thought to be behind a spate of bomb attacks in Austin, Texas, has been killed in an explosion after being cornered by police.
Police in Texas are hunting for clues as to what drove the unemployed young man to apparently launch a bombing spree that terrorised the region.
While searching for possible accomplices and warning people to be on the alert for suspicious packages, officials said that 23-year-old Mark Anthony Conditt is suspected of posting and triggering the bombs that killed two people and injured six.
The young man ended three weeks of anxiety and violence in the early hours of Wednesday when he blew himself up by the side of a road, apparently detonating a device in his vehicle as authorities closed in on him.
“The suspect is deceased and has significant injuries from a blast that occurred from detonating a bomb inside his vehicle,” Austin police chief Brian Manley told reporters on Wednesday.
The suspect lived with two housemates in Pflugerville, a town located 20 miles north-east of Austin. A local politician told a television channel it appeared Conditt had purchased materials to make his bombs from a Home Depot hardware store in Austin.
Reports said among the items he purchased were five signs that read: “CAUTION CHILDREN AT PLAY”. A tripwire bomb that injured two men on Sunday was tied to one of the signs.
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Texas Governor Greg Abbott said the suspect had not served in the military. Although He said his flatmates were cooperating with police.
He said police used mobile traffic data to put the suspect at the site of the explosions around Austin. He said the suspect’s phone number had been used to allow investigators close in on him.
The governor said that as police continued their investigation, people should be on the lookout for anything suspicious.
Throughout the day on Wednesday, police enforced evacuations of homes and businesses around Austin and the town of Pflugerville where the suspect lived in order to search for more bombs.
But federal officials now believe with a “reasonable level of certainty” that there are no more devices “out in the public”.
A witness has described what they saw in the moments apparently following the death of the Austin bombing suspect.
Isaac Figueroa, 26, said he and his brother heard sirens and helicopters early on Wednesday and drove towards them, then cut through nearby woods on foot after they hit a police roadblock.
Mr Figueroa said they saw a silver or grey Jeep Cherokee that was pinned between black and white vehicles and "looked like it had been rammed off the road".
He said he saw police deploy a robot to examine the Jeep.
Additional reporting by AP
At the press conference earlier, Austin mayor Steve Adler thanked law enforcement officials for their work in bringing down the suspect and urged residents to continue to report anything that appeared suspicious or out of place.
"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," he said.
The suspected Austin bomber has been named locally as Mark Anthony Conditt, of Pflugerville, Texas.
The city is north of central Austin and just south-east of Round Rock, where the suspected serial bomber died earlier today in an explosion he triggered when confronted by police.
Victor Gonzales, the mayor of Pflugerville, said he lived only two blocks away from Conditt in an area called Old Town.
Public records showed Conditt's age as 23. Officials had described the suspect as 24.
Investigators had tracked the suspect for a couple of days before closing in at an unidentified hotel in Round Rock, Texas, not for from his home in Pflugerville, Governor Greg Abbott told Fox News.
"We've known for a couple of days who the suspect likely was," Mr Abbott said. "Law enforcement is at his house in Pflugerville where we are learning whether or not that was the location he was making his bombs."
The governor added that the suspect is believed to have lived with two roommates, who are not currently considered suspects, Mr Abbott said. The suspect was not a military veteran, Mr Abbott said.
Austin police are now following up on a report of a suspicious package - they say they are following up all such reports given the current situation.
Police have cleared the scene at a Fed Ex sorting facility near Austin-Bergstrom International Airport after a "follow-up" investigation over a suspicious package.
Mary Conditt, the grandmother of the suspect, has said she was shocked to learn from the news that her grandson was being accused of the attacks, and called him a “very kind” and “loving person.”
She told CNN that Mark Conditt was “very quiet and a deep thinker.” He had been homeschooled and was now “looking forward to figuring out what most kids are – figuring out his life and visiting his family and being close to them,” she said.
Public records showed that Conditt lived with his parents, William and Danene Conditt, until 2017, when he moved into a house about a mile (1.6 km) away.
In 2013 Danene Conditt posted a photo of a man she referred to as Mark on Facebook and said she home schooled her children.
"I officially graduated Mark from High School on Friday. 1 down, 3 to go. He has 30 hrs of college credit too, but he's thinking of taking some time to figure out what he wants to do ... maybe a mission trip," she said in the photo caption.
A spokeswoman for a community college says the suspected Austin bomber was a student there from 2010 to 2012 but didn't graduate.
Austin Community College spokeswoman Jessica Vess said in an email Wednesday that Mark Anthony Conditt hadn't attended the school since that time. She says the school is working with Austin police to provide any information they need.
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