Bombs found in home linked to bank robberies

Associated Press

HELENA, Mont.

Federal agents found homemade bombs in the Montana home of a man they suspect is the “AK-47 Bandit,” who is wanted for a string of bank robberies and is accused of shooting at a Kansas state trooper, according to authorities and court documents filed Monday.

FBI agents were tipped off when Richard Gathercole, 39, called his mother from a Nebraska jail after his arrest in the attempted shooting of the trooper who was trying to pull him over on Interstate 70 last week, according to a search warrant application to a federal judge. The trooper wasn’t injured.

According to a transcript of the call, Gathercole told his mother, who is unnamed, to “get all the guns out” of the house. The woman agrees, then says, “Um, this is recorded. You know that.”