Federal agents reportedly found a supply of the explosive ammonium nitrate, along with a pile of guns and ammo, when they searched the hotel room of a leader of a Texas border militia member earlier this month.
The San Antonio Express-News reported on Wednesday about court records that showed the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives dispatched agents to a hotel in Brownsville, Texas where Kevin “KC” Massey had been staying before his Oct. 20 arrest on weapons charges.
Along with a box containing the chemical, the officers found “an AK-47 with six loaded magazines, a loaded handgun, a ballistic helmet and several cameras,” according to the Texas newspaper.
As the Express-News noted, ammonium nitrate is the substance used by the Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh in the attack that killed 168 people.
Massey belonged to the paramilitary group “Camp Lonestar,” and was described as a “CO,” or commanding officer, in a September profile in the Texas Observer.
He was charged with possession of a firearm by a convicted felon. He was convicted of burglary in 1988.
The Express-News reported further on the circumstances of Massey’s arrest:
Massey was arrested in connection to an Aug. 29 incident during which a Border Patrol agent fired four shots at a man pointing a weapon at the agent near the Rio Grande while pursuing a group of immigrants east of Brownsville, according to documents from the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas in Brownsville.
