PFLUGERVILLE, Texas — The mother of a man who lived with the suspected Austin bomber said Thursday that her son was handcuffed, taken into custody by SWAT officers and held overnight before police found the suspect who blew himself up.
Jennifer Withers told The Associated Press that her 26-year-old son, Collin Thomas, who is black, was walking home from work Wednesday in Pflugerville, just north of Austin, to the house he and another man shared with serial bombing suspect Mark Conditt when a group of officers “flew at him.” She said he was questioned about the bombings but none of his family was notified where he was.
After Conditt died, Thomas was eventually released, she said.
Earlier Thursday, police said they’d released Conditt’s other roommate. They refused to name him, saying he wasn’t currently under arrest.
Austin police spokeswoman Anna Sabana said neither roommate has been charged. She said she did not know why Thomas was detained forcibly in the way his mother described.
Withers said Thomas lived with Conditt for more than three months in a home Conditt was renovating with his father. She said her son was close to a family at the Christian church he attended, and that they introduced him to Conditt’s family, who were also Christian.
She said her son “seemed to get along fine” with Conditt.
“Collin said they all would sit around and chat and talk,” she said.
But Withers said she never got to meet Conditt, and that her son didn’t know anything about the bombs police say he made.
Police said Conditt’s first two bombs killed and injured black victims, leading to speculation that they were hate crimes — though investigators backed off those theories somewhat when subsequent victims were Hispanic and white.
They now say they don’t know what motivated Conditt.
The accused bomber made a 25-minute cellphone recording before his death. It was recovered after he detonated one of his own bombs along the side of Interstate 35 just outside of Austin as a SWAT team moved in.
But investigators say the recording provides few clues as to Conditt’s motives — and they’ve refused to release it publicly, citing the ongoing investigation.
Conditt built bombs planted in different parts of the city that killed two people and severely wounded four others over three weeks starting on March 2. He began by placing explosives in packages left overnight on doorsteps, then rigged an explosive to a tripwire along a public trail. Finally, he sent two parcels with bombs via FedEx.
