US authorities on Thursday made an arrest and announced charges in connection with pipe bombs that were planted outside the headquarters of both the Democratic and Republican parties in Washington DC on the eve of 6 January 2021.
The suspect was named on Thursday afternoon by the Department of Justice as Brian Cole, of suburban Woodbridge, Virginia.
Explosive devices were placed at night and then, on the afternoon of 6 January, the US Capitol attack occurred, when a mob of Donald Trump’s supporters stormed Congress in an effort to prevent the certification of Joe Biden’s win in the 2020 presidential election.
There had been no previous arrests since a suspect placed one pipe bomb in an alley outside the Republican National Committee headquarters and put another bomb on a park bench near the Democratic National Committee headquarters, according to the FBI. A reward for pivotal information was increased in 2023 to $500,000.
“Let me be clear. There was no new tip, there was no new witness, just good diligent police work and prosecutorial work,”the US attorney general, Pam Bondi, said at a press conference on Thursday afternoon.
Bondi said the case had “languished for four years” under the Biden administration and that the arrest of a suspect was made based on a re-examination of existing forensic evidence – an effort led by FBI deputy director Dan Bongino.
“Today’s arrest happened because the Trump administration has made this case a priority,” Bondi said, adding that Cole is being charged in relation to the use and transportation of an explosive device and attempted malicious destruction by means of explosive materials.
“We are dealing with an individual who is accused of making bombs,” the FBI director, Kash Patel, said, asserting that the arrest took place peacefully.
Few other details were given at the press conference and no motive was shared despite reporters’ questions, with the gathered leaders emphasizing that the investigation is at an early stage.
Cole, 30, lives with his parents and works for a bail bond company, a source told Reuters.
The arrest marks the first time investigators have settled on a suspect in an act that had long vexed law enforcement agencies, spawned a multitude of conspiracy theories and remained an enduring mystery in the shadow of the insurrection at the US Capitol.
Videos obtained by the FBI and by the Washington Post at the time of the incidents showed a person believed to be the suspect walking through the neighborhood, wearing a gray hoodie and a mask and carrying a backpack.
The FBI noted that the suspect wore distinctive sneakers – black, gray and yellow Nike Air Max Speed Turf shoes.
The pipe bombs were rendered safe after discovery by police and nobody was hurt, but the FBI has said both devices could have been lethal.
In a complaint unsealed later on Thursday, Cole was charged with transporting an explosive device in interstate commerce with the intent to kill, injure or intimidate any individual or unlawfully to damage or destroy any building, vehicle, or other real or personal property. He was also charged with attempted malicious destruction by means of fire and explosive materials.
According to the complaint, during 2019 and 2020, Cole bought multiple components, including two “white kitchen-style timers”, that were consistent with those used to manufacture two pipe bombs, or IEDs, were bought from Home Depot, Lowes and Walmart outlets in northern Virginia.
Then, early in the afternoon on January 6 2021 law enforcement agencies received reports of a suspected IEDs near the political headquarters of the Republican and Democratic parties. Both contained a main explosive charge, a fuzing system and a container, and both were neutralized.
A day earlier at 7.10pm, the FBI said Cole’s Nissan Sentra was picked up by a license plate reader a half mile from where surveillance video showed who allegedly placed the devices was first observed.
The FBI also said that cell phone records show that Cole’s cell phone communicated with cell towers in the area of the RNC and DNC between 7.39pm and 8.24pm and corresponded with the path the suspect took according to the video surveillance.
The then US vice-president-elect, Kamala Harris, had at some stage passed within 20ft of the explosives outside the DNC headquarters, and both locations are close to the White House.
The suspect was in Virginia when he was arrested on Thursday, according to a law enforcement official, and he was expected to make an initial court appearance in Washington DC, according to a source briefed on the matter.
The incident spawned numerous elaborate theories. Earlier this year, before being installed as FBI deputy director, Dan Bongino advanced an idea that the pipe bombs were an “inside job” perpetrated by the US government.
“The pipe bombs at the DNC where Kamala Harris was on January 6,” Bongino said. “It is now clear to me that this was an inside job.
“I can say with almost absolute certainty from a whistleblower who was there who strongly believes it was a government contractor who planted those bombs to set up a fake assassination plot on Kamala Harris to basically generate sympathy, to shut down people from questioning the vote on January 6,” he said in a September 2024 episode of his podcast.
He was referring to the then forthcoming congressional vote to certify Biden as the president-elect despite challenges from the defeated Trump and staunch allies who claimed – and continue to claim – that Biden lost the election while claiming victory via widespread fraud. Claims of such result-changing fraud were unfounded and, in spite of the deadly attack on the Capitol, Biden’s win was certified in the early hours of 7 January when members of Congress who had fled for their lives returned to the chamber.
Last month, CBS News reported that a federal security officer who had been linked to the pipe bombs cleared her name by producing a video of her playing with her puppies at the time the devices were placed.
That theory appeared to come from a tip to the office of the director of national intelligence, the umbrella intelligence office headed by Tulsi Gabbard.
