FBI Takes Control Of Plano Explosion Investigation
PLANO (CBSDFW.COM) – The FBI has taken over the investigation of an explosion in a Plano residential neighborhood.
That decision means federal authorities believe the man suspected of setting off that explosion was planning to harm someone other than himself. The man was found covered in blood in a residential neighborhood between Coit Road and Independence Parkway.
Police said Monday witnesses saw him tampering with a gas line. Police believe he hurt himself detonating an explosive device near there and made up a cover story to juke investigators.
FBI agents searched a house overnight on Anchor Drive where the suspect lives with his parents. At least one suspicious piece of evidence was treated as a possible explosive and taken to Kaufman County where it was destroyed.
His name has not been released and he remains hospitalized with injuries from that explosion.
Neighbors characterize the man as odd with extremist beliefs.
When agents began searching the home Monday, nearby residents were told to take cover inside their homes on Anchor Drive.
They "told us basically just to move everybody to the back of the house," said Mike Talbot, a neighbor.
On Tuesday, neighbors said the man is a former University of Texas student who is unemployed and lives with his parents.
"Over the years when he came back from Austin he stopped working he doesn't have a social life," a neighbor said.
This neighbor, who asked not to be identified, says the suspect was odd and reclusive but friendly and showed no signs of being violent.
"Living next door to him to be honest I wasn't that worried," he said. "It's sad what happened to the family; they're nice people."
Still, the neighbor says the man under investigation had an unnatural obsession with running through his neighborhood with a backpack and also had extremist beliefs.
"He said he was working on a novel about the new world order conspiracy theories and things like that," said the neighbor.
The FBI has yet to release any information pertaining to what charges, if any, the man will face.
