Texas mom says bomb found at FedEx facility was addressed to her daughter
AUSTIN (KXAN) – As investigators continue to try to draw connections between targets of Mark Conditt’s bombs, the owner of Austin Med Spa on West Sixth Street says one of the packages was addressed to her business.
Suzette Smith says the sixth bomb found — the one that was intercepted at the McKinney Falls Parkway FedEx facility Tuesday morning — was sent to the employee at her spa who handles the mail.
She says it appears her spa was randomly targeted, and there’s no clear connection as to why Austin Med Spa would be a target in Conditt’s bomb attacks.
“He wasn’t a client of ours, and we didn’t know him,” Smith told 24-Hour News 8’s sister station, KXAN.
The employee whose name was on the package wants to stay anonymous. However, her mother, who also works at the spa, told KXAN both she and her daughter were called in for questioning by law enforcement on Tuesday, when the package was found.
“We were asked to come in and answer a few questions, and you theorize like on the way to the police station what it could be,” said Anita Ward Falkenberg.
Ward Falkenberg said she couldn’t say much about what investigators told her. However, she says they told her they’re pretty sure the bomb wasn’t specifically for her daughter, but rather the spa as a whole.
“We’re told that we were targeted here at the spa just generally,” Ward Falkenberg said.
Ward Falkenberg and Smith believe they might have been randomly chosen because of the spa’s central location.
“Everybody just assumes that it’s not going to affect them or it’s going to be someone else’s house, and frankly we probably we felt that same way too,” Smith said. “We were still looking at packages, like I’m sure everybody in Austin was doing, but still, in the back of our heads, we never actually thought that it would affect us.”
Both Smith and Ward Falkenberg say they’re thankful police and FBI agents have been so fast acting and helpful throughout the process.
“We’re very very grateful that it was intercepted before it was shipped here,” Smith said. “We are just in complete shock that this even happened and got this far, and we’re grateful that the FBI was able to intercept, and we just feel for the families that have been really been struck tragically by the actions of this man.”