Police visited Nashville bomber Anthony Warner’s home over one year ago after his girlfriend said he was building bombs in the RV, documents show.
Warner blew up a city block in downtown Nashville, Tennessee, early Christmas morning, police said. He died in the explosion and the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation declared that he wasn’t on their “radar” before the incident.
However, an August 2019 report from the Metro Nashville Police Department (MNPD) shows that his ex-girlfriend Pamela Perry made authorities aware of alleged bomb-making over a year earlier, The Tennessean reported.
Perry informed police that Warner “was building bombs in the RV trailer at his residence” on Aug. 21, 2019, a report from MNPD indicates.
Police connected with Perry when her attorney, Raymond Throckmorton III, called them that day over concerns about alleged suicidal threats she was making as she sat outside her home with guns, the Associated Press reported, citing an MNPD statement.
Throckmorton told police that he represented Warner as well. Perry’s comments about the alleged bomb making were given to the FBI and police went to Warner’s home about a mile and a half away, where Warner did not answer the door.
This is Anthony Warner, the suicide bomber implicated in the devastating Christmas morning bombing in downtown Nashville. Motive still unclear. pic.twitter.com/hYQjwHQMXT
— Phil Williams (@NC5PhilWilliams) December 28, 2020
At the time, the report showed that the RV was parked inside a fence behind Warner’s home and police couldn’t peer inside of it. The home had “several security cameras and wires attached to a [sic] alarm sign on the front door,” the report said. (RELATED: The ‘World Is Never Going To Forget Me’: Nashville Suicide Bomber Left Eerie Message With Neighbor)
“They saw no evidence of a crime and had no authority to enter his home or fenced property,” MNPD spokesman Don Aaron told The Tennessean about how that situation unfolded.
As for the FBI’s involvement, they “reported back” the following day and “found no records on Warner at all” after checking holdings, according to Aaron. The Department of Defense subsequently reported on Aug. 28, 2019 that “checks on Warner were all negative,” Aaron added.
Police say they followed up during the week of Aug. 26, 2019 and called Throckmorton. The attorney allegedly said officers couldn’t speak to Warner or go to his property, the FBI said to The Tennessean.
Throckmorton disputed this claim and says he wasn’t working with Warner in August 2019, The Tennessean reported.
“I have no memory of that whatsoever,” Throckmorton said. “I didn’t represent him anymore. He wasn’t an active client. I’m not a criminal defense attorney.”
“Somebody, somewhere dropped the ball,” Throckmorton added.