Crime & Safety

Austin Bombing Suspect Left Video Confession

Serial bomber blew himself up with one of his own devices he used to terrorize a city. Police found a video confession on his cell phone.

ROUND ROCK, TX — The suspect in a deadly bombing spree who terrorized the Austin region for weeks left a video confession before he blew himself up in a vehicle on Interstate 35 in Round Rock early Wednesday morning as authorities closed in on him.

The suspect has since been identified as Mark Anthony Conditt, 23, as outlined in an arrest warrant the night before he triggered his final detonation on himself as police closed in on him. NBC News and others have since posted video surveillance footage showing a seemingly disguised Conditt, wearing a long blonde wig and donning gloves while mailing packages at a FedEx store, the night before his death.

Police also revealed what amounts to a 25-minute confession found on the suspect's cell phone in which he details each of the detonated devices in excruciating detail as to their construction.

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Since Conditt's death, police have converged on a house in nearby Pflugerville, Texas, where the suspect lived with roommates. Austin police confirmed two roommates have been detained for questioning. Police also revealed during a Wednesday afternoon press conference they secured a search warrant for the house where munitions were found, but officials noted neither roommate has been arrested. Separately, Austin police released the arrest warrant local police had already secured for Conditt the night before he died.

In Pflugerville, local police spent the better part of the day removing additional bomb components in the suspect's room that police said has a lock to the door. A five-block perimeter cordoned off access to the neighborhood out of an abundance of caution in case any ordnance might be at the home that could detonate, police explained. Pflugerville Police Chief Jessica Robledo pleaded with residents to be patient, noting the inconvenience in not being able to access their homes was for their own safety.

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"For the last several hours, explosive experts have been from the FBI, ATF, working to safely remove and dispose of home-made explosives located inside of a residence in Pflugerville, Texas," Robledo told reporters during an afternoon press briefing, noting the address where Conditt lived as 403 N. Second St. "Now, these federal agencies have been working around the clock with local and other federal agencies. Law enforcement have not left this investigation. They have left their families in order to keep this community safe, and we're working together."

She said evacuations in a five-block area were necessary in order to keep residents safe: "I want to ensure the citizens of Pflugerville and those in adjoining jurisdictions that the reason that we evacuated for a five-block radius was for their safety, to allow these these law enforcement agencies to do their job."

As the press conference was being conducted, Austin police released a copy of a federal criminal complaint and arrest warrant for Conditt that was secured last night prior to his death as they closed in on the suspect.

Austin Police Chief Brian Manley said at a Wednesday morning news conference that despite the suspect's death, the community should remain "vigilant" as authorities don't know where the suspect traveled over the past 24 hours and more bombs could be out there. An FBI spokesman echoed those sentiments.

Evidence of that ongoing vigilance was illustrated at a FedEx ground facility near Austin-Bergstom International Airport to which law enforcement officials returned Wednesday for the second time in as many days, the Austin-American Statesman reported. At 10 a.m., Austin police returned at the facility along the 4100 block of McKinney Falls Parkway in Southeast Austin for what they described as "follow-up investigations."

Related stories:

Austin Bomber's 'Biggest Mistake Was Going Through FedEx'

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Pflugerville Streets Closed Amid Suspicious Package Report

Austin Bombings: How You Can Help Victims' Families

Police had surveillance teams looking for the suspect, and tracked a vehicle he was known to drive to a hotel parking lot in Round Rock. Police took up positions near the hotel as they awaited ballistic vehicles to arrive and take the man into custody. As they waited, the vehicle drove off.

Police pursued him until he stopped in a ditch on the side of the roadway. As SWAT teams approached the vehicle, the suspect detonated an explosive device, knocking back a SWAT officer, Manley said. One officer, an 11-year veteran member of the Austin SWAT team, also shot at the suspect.

"The suspect is deceased and has significant injuries from a blast that occurred from detonating a bomb from inside the vehicle," Manley said.

One officer suffered minor injuries in the blast, while the yet-unidentified officer who fired at the suspect is now on administrative leave as is the custom after officer-involved shootings, Manley said. The portion of I-35 where the pursuit ended is now a crime scene.

In another press conference replete with stunning details, among the most breathtaking is the revelation of a 25-minute recording left behind by Conditt — a video manifesto of sorts, as some reporters have taken to calling it — in which the dead suspect is said to have confessed to the bombings, Manley said. Flanked by various law enforcement agents, Gov. Greg Abbott and Austin Mayor Steve Adler and others, Manley described the nature of some of the video's contents.

"I would classify this as a confession," Manley said without hesitation, noting Conditt detailed the nature of each detonated device used with a great degree of specificity in a video he estimated was made the night before his death between 9 p.m. and 11 p.m. Aside from yielding a raw litany of confession to criminality, the recording also sheds light on motive. Declining to specify details, the recording found on Conditt's phone paints a picture of a disaffected young man feeling aggrieved by personal challenges..

"We were concerned throughout the investigation what was the motive, what was the reason," Manley said of the three-week bombing spree that terrorized the Austin region. "What is clear from listening to that video is that this was a very troubled young man who was talking about challenges in his life which led him to the point to take the actions he took and there are also indications of actions he was willing to take in the future."

Another key revelation is the Conditt's actions — as horrific and deplorable as they are — were not motivated by hatred of any one specific group of people as many writers asserted over the course of the three-week crime spree. Multiple publications (both local and national) assigned a racial motivation to the killings given that the first two victims were black, the most ambitious of these treatises reaching far back into undeniably racist policies dating to the early part of the city's history as supposed proof of a hate crime in the making to buttress their theses.

Manley disabused theorists of such notions: "It was important for this community to understand that his comments were not at all reflective of either a hate-based or terrorism-based approach to what he did."

Back in Pflugerville, a heavy police presence descended to the nearby town of Pflugerville to converge on the house on 2nd Streeet where the bomber lived. Last night, the Pflugerville police chief ordered a portion of downtown Pflugerville to be closed amid reports of suspicious activity around a mailbox there. She assured residents at the afternoon press conference that the five- block radius will be gradually shrunk to begin allowing residents back into their homes piecemeal. In the meantime, she urged evacuated residents to visit their local library or recreation center until 9 p.m. to allow bomb specialists in law enforcement to investigate the home.

"What we're going to do soon is we're going to shrink that perimeter a few blocks, and you will see police officers and barricades coming up to the railroad, Walnut and 2nd Street area. It will take several hours to process the scene, and I know we have asked every resident in that perimeter to leave their home. That was a diff task, but hat's how much we care about their safety."

Well into the early evening, residents in the area were still unable to access their homes as munitions, home-made bombs, components and other material were removed from the suspect's house: "Ladies and gentlemen, patience is going to have work with us here. We know everyone wants to go home, everyone ones to eat dinner with their families. We want that for you, but we also want to assure that you sleep safe tonight.

Other places were closed outright to accommodate the investigation: "Pflugerville City Hall is closed," the Pflugerville Police Department's public information officer Helena Wright said in a prepared statement sent to Patch. "Residents have been evacuated from downtown Pflugerville west of Railroad and North of Pecan. Please stay clear of the area as agencies continue to work."

Pflugerville Mayor Victor Gonzales reportedly told the Associated Press that he lives a mere two blocks away from the home believed to be where Conditt lived, in a part of the city known as Old Town. A message from Patch to Gonzales seeking comment was not immediately returned.

By noon, Gonzales released a videotaped statement for residents, albeit one lacking any details related to the police activity in the city for which he serves as mayor:

Mere hours after the suspected Austin serial bomber's death, details about his life began to emerge via multiple media outlets. He reportedly attended Austin Community College, and worked as a computer repair tech and a "purchasing agent/buyer/shipping and receiving" clerk at Crux Manufacturing in Austin, a builder of metal products specializing in robotics and mechanical repair.

Multiple news outlets indicate that Conditt used an "exotic" foreign battery in his explosives. According to information found on its website, Crux Manufacturing specializes in handling such so-called "exotic materials." The company is located at 1421 Wells Branch Parkway in Pflugerville, about a mile away from where the suspect was living before his death.

On her Facebook page, his mother wrote Conditt had been home-schooled prior to graduating high school while proudly announcing his graduation in 2013. "He's thinking of taking some time to figure out what he wants to do," his mother wrote upon her son's high school graduation. "Maybe a mission trip."

With hope, the overnight developments bring an end to a weeks-long spate of bombings in Austin where four package bombings since March 2 were detonated, killing two people and injuring another six — including the mother of a teenage boy killed in a blast and a 75-year-old woman, both still recovering from their injuries. Two bicyclists inadvertently coming upon a tripwire that detonated a package bomb last Sunday remain in good condition at the St. David's South Austin Medical Center, a spokeswoman told Patch on Wednesday. A fifth parcel bomb detonated at a FedEx distribution center in Schertz, near San Antonio, early Tuesday, but no injuries were reported in that incident other than a woman complaining of subsequent ringing in her ears.

An internal affairs unit within the Austin Police Department will investigate the officer-involved shooting. Texas Rangers will conduct a criminal investigation into the overnight incident. Specific details that led to the overnight incident are not being released at this time, Manley said, because an investigation remains ongoing.

Fred Milanowski, an agent in charge of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms' Houston Field Division, told reporters Wednesday they know when the bombing suspect bought explosive materials, but that it wasn't immediately clear whether he built bombs prior to the spree.

Manley wouldn't say whether the bombings were the act of a single individual or whether multiple people are suspected, but did say authorities believe the now-deceased suspect was responsible for all of the bombings beginning on March 2. Manley also didn't reveal where the suspect lived.

Austin Mayor Steve Adler told NBC News Today: “I think a lot of the details you’re going to have to get from the Chief … but they are confident that they have someone who has been responsible for these bombs going off and as a community 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.”

Adler added, “As for motive, we don’t know at this point … but the investigation is continuing and we’re asking people to remain vigilant and to still identify things in the community that seem suspicious or out of place.”

The night before the suspect's death, U.S. Rep. Michael McCaul, a Republican from Austin who's chairman of the U.S. House Homeland Security Committee, predicted the suspect's later use of FedEx to send his lethal parcels would be his undoing. It appears that may have been the case, as police closed in on him when he seemingly changed his earlier tactic of leaving packages containing explosives on doorsteps or front porches.

The video footage from the FedEx stores he frequented could "quite possibly" show the serial bomber, McCaul told the Associated Press, adding that the serial bomber's "biggest mistake was going through FedEx,"

Donald Trump weighed in on Twitter, praising the law enforcement officers for putting an end to the crime spree: "AUSTIN BOMBING SUSPECT IS DEAD," he tweeted. "Great job by law enforcement and all concerned," he said.

Amid the din of Wednesdays' dramatic developments, the families of both the suspect and the victims who died in the bomber's deadly campaign released statements.

  • "We are devastated and broken at the news that our family member could be involved in such an awful way," the serial bomber's family wrote. "We had no idea of the darkness that Mark must have been in. Our family is a normal family in every way. We love, we pray, and we try to inspire and serve others. Right now, our prayers are for the families who lost loved ones, for those impacted in any way, and for the soul of our Mark. We are grieving and in shock."
  • The family of Draylen Masson, 17, a promising musician killed by a parcel bomb on March 12, said: “We want to thank the law enforcement officials who have worked diligently on this case. We have been humbled by the overwhelming support of the community and of those who loved Draylen as we did. Our hearts also go out to the families who have been impacted by these senseless crimes and we pray for them as well. “We are a family of faith and we know that with God all things are possible. The most recent chain of events have brought some sense of closure that our beloved has received justice and we are prayerful that we can now start to move forward with our lives."
  • Elliott House, the father of the first victim who died after handling a lethal package March 2, issued a statement as well: "I wish to express my deepest appreciation for the exhaustive efforts and work, of the Austin Police Department, The Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms agency, and other agencies that participated in this investigation of the series of explosive devices. Hopefully, the death of the bomb maker suspect ends the ring of fear and terror in the Austin area, although it leaves a few questions, shared with both the family of my son, Anthony House, and 17 year-old Draylen Mason, both being black and the only deaths in the series of bombings. We are plagued with how they were selected and why."

The interactive map below shows the locations where parcels were detonated since March 2.


A robust police presence had surrounded a home along Camille Street in Pflugerville the day the suspect in the serial bombing incidents died, giving rise to speculation that he lived there. Below is a map of that area:

Patch reporter Tony Cantú contributed to this report.

>>> Photo: Law enforcement officials investigate at the location where the suspected package bomber was killed in suburban Austin on March 21, 2018, in Round Rock, Texas. The 23-year-old suspect blew himself up inside his car as police approached the vehicle. A massive search had been underway by local and federal law enforcement officials in Austin and the surrounding area after several package bombs had detonated in recent weeks, killing two people and injuring several others. (Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images)


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