Mad Bomber Sought in Bomb Threats

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. – The FBI is looking for a man who allegedly threatened employees, members and customers at U.S. New Mexico FCU and Bank of America with bombs. In the B of A threat, the suspect kidnapped two bystanders, attached fanny packs purported to be explosives to them, and told them to rob the bank. Photos of the suspect taken from surveillance video at the credit union were being circulated by the FBI yesterday. On Aug. 17, the suspect left a black gym bag in a men’s room stall at the credit union, then called in a bomb threat the following morning. But the suspect did not demand money, according to Johnny Montoya, vice president of marketing for the credit union. "He’s just some kind of a whack job," Montoya told The Credit Union Journal yesterday. The credit union evacuated the building and the police bomb squad responded with an x-ray machine that detected wires inside the bag that could have been connected to explosives. The bag was removed by a police robot, but the object later was determined not to be a bomb. In the Bank of America incident, a suspect believed to be the same man kidnapped two employees in an adjacent doctor’s office last Friday and forced them to wear fanny packs he said were bombs, then go to the bank and demand money. The victims were able to remove the fanny packs, which turned out not to contain explosives.