ASPEN, Colo. (AP) - A one-time resident of this city who had
been bitter over its transformation into a playground for the rich
left four gift-wrapped bombs downtown in a bank-robbery attempt,
turning New Year's Eve celebrations into a mass evacuation, police
said Thursday.
The dangerous bombs were made of gasoline and cell phone parts
and came with notes warning of "mass death." The 72-year-old man
suspected of placing them in two banks and in an alleyway on
Wednesday shot and killed himself a short time later, police said.
The body of James Chester Blanning, who grew up in Aspen and
lived in Denver since 2003, was found Thursday, police said.
Blanning walked into two Aspen banks about 2:30 p.m. Wednesday
and left packages wrapped in holiday paper along with notes saying
the boxes contained bombs, police said. The notes threatened "mass
death," demanded $60,000 cash and included criticisms of President
George W. Bush, Assistant Aspen Police Chief Bill Linn said at a
news conference.
Blanning's notes said he was targeting four banks, police said,
but only two - a Wells Fargo Bank and a nearby Vectra Bank -
received the packages.
Later, police found two similar packages atop a black sled in a
downtown alley. Linn said the bombs were dangerous, containing
plastic bladders of gasoline, but he did not say how sophisticated
they were.
"We believe the suspect abandoned his plan halfway through,"
said Linn, who said Blanning's notes didn't name the other two
banks he planned to target.
The threats prompted police to clear nearly all of downtown
Aspen - 16 blocks that otherwise would have been filled with tens
of thousands of New Year's revelers. Residents were allowed to
return at 4 a.m. Thursday, and the town's holiday fireworks were
rescheduled for Thursday night.
Linn said police bomb squads detonated the bombs once the area
was cleared, and that one of the packages created a fireball
outside a Wells Fargo bank when police detonated it. No one was
injured.
The Aspen Times reported that Blanning left a typewritten note
at the newspaper's offices Wednesday evening. The profanity-laced
note, which appeared to match those Blanning left at banks, said
"Aspen will pay a horrible price in blood" if his demands were
not met.
On the outside of the envelope containing the note was
Blanning's handwritten "last will and testament," which left
three Denver properties to two men. He gave no motive, but wrote,
"I was and am a good man."
The note also said a fifth bomb was "hidden in a high end
watering hole." Linn said Aspen bars had been searched but that no
additional bomb was discovered.
Blanning was found dead alone in his Jeep Cherokee east of Aspen
early Thursday, Linn said. In the car police found a rifle and a
handgun they believe Blanning used to kill himself.
Police had released Blanning's name and picture before finding
his body; he had been spotted on a surveillance tape from one of
the banks. Linn said Blanning was well known to police and that the
Pitkin County sheriff remembered him from a 1994 suicide threat.
According to newspaper accounts, Blanning climbed atop the
county courthouse with a noose that year and threatened suicide.
Blanning was talked off the courthouse after seven hours; he told
reporters afterward that he was protesting the "elitists" of
Aspen and was angry about a 1990s Colorado Supreme Court ruling
about a mining claim.
Aspen residents recalled Blanning as an eccentric who grew up
fascinated by Aspen's past as a silver mining town. People who knew
Blanning say he became disenchanted with his hometown as it became
an increasingly exclusive destination for the wealthy.
Mary Eshbaugh Hayes, who writes a weekly society column for The
Aspen Times, knew Blanning as a boy in the 1950s and once employed
him as a driver for her trucking company in the 1960s. Hayes
recalls firing Blanning, a noted skier in high school, because he
was unreliable.
"He was a very good skier, but he didn't really fit into the
new Aspen," Hayes said Thursday.
Blanning said in his handwritten note that he had spent time in
prison. Linn said he had been convicted in a land scheme, but
further details weren't immediately available.