FBI searches apartment of bomb park guard

FBI searches apartment of bomb park guard

ATLANTA (Reuter): FBI agents probing the Olympic blast yesterday searched the apartment of a security guard from the bombed park and evacuated other residents.

The agents and the guard, Richard Jewell, 33, later came out of the apartment and a bomb sniffing dog with two handlers went inside.

FBI spokesman David Tubbs told about 50 reporters staking out Jewell's working class suburban home that neighbors and the media were being moved back for safety reasons.

Jewell, a private security guard at Olympic Centennial Park, was hailed as a hero after he alerted police to a knapsack containing a pipe bomb that exploded early on Saturday. Two people died and 110 were injured.

Residents of Jewell's and other neighboring apartment buildings, including a woman in a bathrobe with small children, were hurriedly evacuated by police and FBI men in blue fatigues as plainclothes agents searched the apartment.

Jewell had been in the apartment since he was questioned at FBI headquarters in Atlanta on Tuesday.

The building was staked out all night by reporters and camera crews and several police squad cars. Jewell and his lawyer say he is innocent.

Tubbs told reporters as the search began that the issue of a search warrant, "Does not indicate in any way that Mr Jewell has been charged with a crime under out system of justice. Mr Jewell has not been placed under arrest."

He said the FBI had gone through a list of many potential suspects since the attack and eliminated them.

Jewell's lawyer, Watson Bryant, arrived shortly after the search began but made no comment.

He said earlier on NBC television that Jewell "feels unfairly victimized."

Bryant said on Tuesday: "Richard had nothing whatsoever to do with planting that bomb. He had nothing to do with the bomb at all except being a hero by finding it, then getting people out of the way."

Jewell's middle-aged mother and a pet dog left the apartment shortly before the FBI agents arrived.

Residents evacuated from the area were taken in FBI vans to a nearby motel. One of them, Betty Bacma said, "It's a bit scary."

A neighbor, pensioner Don Rosenberg, said: "We haven't had so much excitement here since the place was built. "

Jewell, a celebrity since the bombing, has given many television and newspaper interviews. He said he alerted police when he spotted a suspicious knapsack in the park, central entertainment area for the Olympic Games.

The bomb, packed with a deadly shrapnel of screws and nails, exploded as police were still trying to evacuate people away from the area by a lighting tower during a packed rock concert in the park.

Before Tuesday, the FBI investigation had apparently focused on a white American male who made a warning call from a nearby public phone 13 minutes before the bomb exploded.

Investigators had also targeted rightwing militia groups, opposed to the federal government and gun controls.