California Bomb Arrest Has Montana Ties

Investigators said that a suspect in the discovery of 505 pounds of explosives in the Yuba-Sutter area of California worked for a Montana firm where containers of the explosive were stolen earlier this year.

Yuba County District Attorney Charles O’Rourke said Kevin Quinn, 37, who was arrested Wednesday at a Yuba City home where a cache of the explosive Petrogel was discovered in a motor home, had worked for the Montana mining firm where the explosives were taken.

Quinn hasn’t been charged in the theft of the explosives, and authorities declined to identify the firm from which the petrogel was taken.

Authorities, who have been investigating possible ties to antigovernment militia groups, are still trying to determine how the explosives made it to California. Paul Snabel, a San Francisco special agent for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, said he has assiged 20 investigators to the case. They are trying to trace as much as 80,000 pounds of petrogel that the manufacturer delivered to High West Inc., a Billings, Mont., firm.

Although no explosives were stolen from High West itself, authorities want to determine if any other explosives were stolen from the firms that are clients of High West.

The mystery over the explosives and possible militia ties began when explosives detonated outside a house rented by William Goehler, rocking his Olivehurst neighborhood.

Goehler, 34, is a supporter of the anti-government Montana Freemen. He was charged with the blast that injured both him and his 2-year-old daughter. Authorities said they believe Quinn was at Goehler’s house when the blast occurred.