MJTF PATROLS FRUSTRATED IN COLO. & N. CAROLINA
Anonymous
Agents backtrack in hunt for bombing suspect
By Scott Duncan
ANDREWS, N.C. (Reuters) - Federal agents have searched about 10 square miles
of a rugged 30 square-mile tract in the western North Carolina mountains
where they believe abortion clinic bombing suspect Eric Robert Rudolph is
hiding, an FBI special agent said Monday.
Teams of federal agents and local law enforcement officers also were
backtracking over mountain trails and remote cabins for new clues as they
began the second week of a methodical manhunt for one of the FBI's 10 Most
Wanted fugitives.
"We may go back again" to some of the areas already searched, said Woody
Enderson, who heads the Southeast Bomb Task Force investigating a series of
bombings in the region over the past three years.
The FBI has offered a $1 million reward for information leading to the
arrest of Rudolph, who has been charged in the January 29 bombing of a
Birmingham, Alabama abortion clinic that killed an off-duty policeman and
injured a nurse.
Rudolph, 31, also is wanted for questioning in three earlier Atlanta-area
bombings, including the July 1996 Centennial Olympic Park blast in Atlanta
that killed a woman and injured more than 100 people.
Teams of federal agents returned to a mountain cabin home of George
Nordmann, the owner of a health food store who reported seeing Rudolph July
7 when the fugitive came to his cabin seeking provisions.
Nordmann has been under media siege since reopening his store over the
weekend, but has declined comment.
According to the FBI, Rudolph on July 9 took the man's battered 1977 Datsun
pick-up truck and a six-month supply of food before ditching the truck in a
nearby U.S. Forest Service campground and retreating into the hills.
The truck was found early last Monday in the Bob Allison campground near
Nantahala Lake east of Andrews, North Carolina, where federal agents have
since concentrated their manhunt. Andrews is about 120 miles north of
Atlanta.
Operating out of a campsite that normally hosts Boy Scout troops and
vacationing campers, teams of heavily armed, camouflaged agents have been
able to hike about 10-15 miles a day in their search for Rudolph, who grew
up in the area and is said to be an accomplished outdoorsman.
The painstaking manhunt has been slowed as the agents struggle through dense
undergrowth and dodge rattlesnakes seeking shade from a scorching summer sun
in rocky crevices along mountain ridges and trails.