The Nashville man suspected of blowing himself up inside his RV on Christmas Day hinted at the attack less than a week before the blast, according to a neighbor.
Rick Laude told the Associated Press on Monday that a few days before the attack, he had seen his neighbor Anthony Warner standing outside near his mailbox and pulled up in his car to make conversation. After asking about Warner’s mother, Laude said he asked, “Is Santa going to bring you anything good for Christmas?”
“Oh, yeah, Nashville and the world is never going to forget me,” Warner said with a smile, according to Laude.
Laude said he didn’t think twice about the comment and thought that Warner might have been referring to some financial windfall. “Nothing about this guy raised any red flags,” Laude said.
“He was just quiet,” Laude said.
More details have emerged from the dayslong investigation into the blast, which injured three others and caused damage to several buildings in downtown Nashville. Prior to the explosion, the RV blared a loud warning that it was about to explode and played the 1964 hit “Downtown” by Petula Clark.
Authorities are still working to figure out an exact motive for the attack, which came in the early morning hours.
The Daily Mail reported that a source close to the investigation said Warner, the 63-year-old identified by authorities as the suspect who detonated the bomb and killed himself, was “heavily into conspiracy theories” and while “we are waiting on the digital footprint that should finally provide us with some answers … the unofficial motive thus far is the suspect believed 5G was the root of all deaths in the region and he’d be hailed a hero.”
