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Colorado Springs man suspected in Las Vegas vehicle explosion

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Chase Woodruff
(Colorado Newsline)

Federal law enforcement agents Thursday conducted operations at a home in Colorado Springs believed to belong to the man responsible for a New Year’s Day vehicle explosion outside Republican President-elect Donald Trump’s Las Vegas hotel.

Agents from the Federal Bureau of Investigations, the Colorado Springs Police Department and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms were on the scene at a condo complex in northeast Colorado Springs beginning early Thursday morning.

“This activity is related to the explosion in Las Vegas on Wednesday,” the FBI’s Denver field office said in a social media post. “Due to the ongoing nature of the investigation, no further information will be provided out of Denver.”

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In a press conference in Las Vegas on Thursday, Kevin McMahill, the sheriff of the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department, identified the suspect in the explosion as 37-year-old Matthew Livelsberger, an Army master sergeant assigned to Special Forces Command.

A body recovered from the exploded Tesla Cybertruck was “burnt beyond recognition,” McMahill said, and investigators are seeking confirmation through DNA evidence or medical records that the remains belong to Livelsberger. But a “tremendous amount” of evidence, including recovered photo identification and rental records for the truck, point to Livelsberger as the suspect, the sheriff said.

“We tracked his movement from Colorado to Las Vegas, and in a number of the photographs, we were able to determine he was the individual that was driving the vehicle,” said McMahill. “We still have only ever seen him in this vehicle, and we’re not aware of any other subjects involved in this particular case.”

Forensic evidence suggests the driver of the vehicle, which was rented in Denver December 28, suffered what appeared to be a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head prior to the detonation. No one else was killed in the explosion, though at least seven people were injured.

McMahill said Livelsberger spent “most of his time” at Fort Carson, the U.S. Army base just south of Colorado Springs, and overseas in Germany. Authorities have traced the route he took from Denver south to Trinidad and through New Mexico and Arizona over the course of several days before arriving in Las Vegas around 7:00 a.m. January 1.

McMahill and other senior law enforcement officials said Thursday they don’t believe the Las Vegas explosion is connected to a terrorist attack in New Orleans in the early-morning hours of Jan. 1. In that incident, 15 people were killed and another 35 were injured after a suspect drove a truck into a crowd on Bourbon Street.

“Obviously we’re always concerned in these sorts of events to ascertain what the motive is,” said Spencer Evans, the FBI’s special agent in charge of the Las Vegas field office. “We understand that’s at the forefront of everyone’s thoughts. Looking into exactly what the motive is remains our number-one priority.”


Colorado Newsline is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Colorado Newsline maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Quentin Young for questions: info@coloradonewsline.com.