Heath Haussamen / NMPolitics.net
Hours after a bomb exploded outside Calvary Baptist Church on Aug. 2, the road to the church remained closed while law enforcement combed the grounds for evidence.
Investigators believe a bomb found undetonated last week near the entrance to First Presbyterian Church in Las Cruces was placed by the same person or people who set off two bombs at churches here earlier this month.
That’s according to The New York Times, which reported Wednesday on the recent explosions in Las Cruces. “Still, more than two weeks after the explosions, the local and federal authorities have yet to uncover a plausible motive, a potential suspect or a clear link among the churches other than their shared Christianity,” the newspaper reported.
Las Crucens have been on high alert since the Aug. 2 explosions. The county sheriff’s bomb squad and other agencies — local and federal — have been called to investigate numerous suspicious packages and bomb threats, most recently an incident at a department store on Thursday.
Except for the discovery of the third, undetonated bomb at First Presbyterian last Friday, all have been false alarms.
Officials think all three bombs — the two that exploded at Holy Cross Catholic Church and Calvary Baptist Church and the undetonated device at First Presbyterian — were placed by the same person or people, The Times quoted Stephan Marshall, the chief division counsel for the F.B.I. in Albuquerque, as saying.
But, the newspaper quoted him as saying, “at this point, we haven’t gotten anything definitive.”
From the article:
“We’re still connecting the dots,” the police chief in Las Cruces, Jaime Montoya, said in an interview.
Investigators have cast a broad net, questioning political activists, members and neighbors of the churches, as well as witnesses to the blasts, in search of clues — any clue.