What we know about Cybertruck explosion suspect Matthew Livelsberger
Las Vegas Sheriff’s Office
(LAS VEGAS) — The suspect who drove the rented Cybertruck that exploded outside of the Trump International Hotel Las Vegas on New Year’s Day has been identified as Master Sgt. Matthew Livelsberger, a U.S. Army Special Operations soldier on leave, law enforcement sources told ABC News.
Livelsberger was killed when the truck, which was filled with fireworks-style mortars and gas canisters, exploded around 8:40 a.m. PT. Seven people suffered minor injuries, officials said.
Investigators believe the explosion was intentional, but hadn’t determined a motive or how it was detonated as of Thursday afternoon, according to sources.
As they continue their investigation into the blast, a profile of Livelsberger is emerging from the Army and people who knew him.
Livelsberger’s wife told investigators her husband had been out of their Colorado Springs, Colorado, residence since around Christmas after a dispute over allegations of infidelity and said he would not hurt anyone, an official who had been briefed on the investigation told ABC News. Livelsberger allegedly supported President-elect Donald Trump, the official said.
Livelsberger enlisted in the Army as a Special Forces candidate and served on active duty from January 2006 to March 2011 then joined the National Guard that month and served until July 2012, followed by a stint in the Army Reserve from July to December 2012, according to the spokesperson. He went back on active duty in December 2012 as a Special Operations soldier, the spokesperson said.
He was on approved leave from the Army at the time of his death, according to U.S. Army Special Operations Command.
“USASOC is in full cooperation with federal and state law enforcement agencies, but as a matter of policy, will not comment on ongoing investigations,” the spokesperson said.
Livelsberger rented the Cybertruck using the car-sharing app Turo, the same app used to rent a truck by the suspect in the New Orleans attack on New Year’s Day, though investigators said they have not established any links between the two attacks.
Livelsberger told the truck’s owner that he was going camping at the Grand Canyon, the official said.
Tesla has been cooperating with the probe and provided investigators with data and other information, the company’s owner Elon Musk said.
(GREEN LAKE, Wis.) — Ryan Borgwardt, the husband and father who authorities said faked his own death at a lake and fled the country, has returned to the U.S. willingly and is now in custody in Wisconsin, the Green Lake County Sheriff’s Office announced on Wednesday.
Borgwardt — who is accused of intentionally misleading authorities to believe he drowned this summer — notified officials he was returning and he landed in the U.S. on Tuesday, Sheriff Mark Podoll said at a news conference, but the sheriff did not reveal from where he flew.
Podoll said authorities are still putting together where Borgwardt was and who he was with since he vanished in August, but said he’s “cooperated” with law enforcement.
Borgwardt “researched other individuals that had successfully disappeared recently,” including lake deaths and “how deep a body has to be without resurfacing,” according to the criminal complaint.
When he was abroad and trying to stay under the radar, Borgwardt said he checked the news but usually avoided clicking on articles, the complaint said. The criminal complaint mentions Borgwardt having been in the country of Georgia.
Borgwardt said when he did click on a news article, “he would use a VPN and sometimes make it look like he was in Russia or somewhere else other than Georgia,” the complaint said. “Ryan stated that he knew that Georgia would have to extradite him and he wanted to be informed and prepared.”
Asked what compelled Borgwardt to come back, Podoll said, “His family, I guess.”
Podoll did not say if Borgwardt has had contact with his wife and children.
Borgwardt, who is charged with obstructing an officer, made his first court appearance on Wednesday. He faces up to a $10,000 fine and nine months in prison for alleged obstruction of an officer.
A signature bond was set at $500, since he “voluntarily turned himself in” from “halfway around the world,” the judge said. When the judge asked if he could afford any bail, Borgwardt replied, “I have $20 in my wallet.”
The case began on Aug. 11, when Borgwardt texted his wife that he was turning his kayak around on Green Lake and heading to shore soon, Podoll said.
But the dad of three never came home.
Responders found Borgwardt’s overturned kayak and life jacket in the lake and believed he drowned, officials said.
Crews scoured the lake for weeks using divers, drones, sonar and cadaver K-9s, but never found him, officials said.
In October, investigators discovered Borgwardt’s name had been checked by law enforcement in Canada two days after he vanished on the lake, the sheriff said.
Authorities also learned Borgwardt had been communicating with a woman from Uzbekistan, the sheriff said.
Borgwardt’s other suspicious behavior included: clearing his browsers the day he disappeared, inquiring about moving funds to foreign banks, obtaining a new passport and getting a new life insurance policy, the sheriff said.
Authorities determined Borgwardt was alive and likely in Eastern Europe or western Asia, but they didn’t know exactly where he was located. Authorities made contact with a woman who speaks Russian, and in November, they reached Borgwardt through that woman, authorities said.
Borgwardt said when he got the email from authorities, his “heart hit the floor,” the complaint said.
Borgwardt told police he was safe but didn’t reveal his location, the sheriff said.
Borgwardt did reveal to authorities how he faked his death.
“He stashed an e-bike near the boat launch. He paddled his kayak in a child-sized floating boat out into the lake. He overturned the kayak and dumped his phone in the lake,” the sheriff said at a news conference in November. “He paddled the inflatable boat to shore and got on his e-bike and rode through the night to Madison, [Wisconsin]. In Madison, he boarded a bus and went to Detroit, and then the Canadian border.”
Borgwardt said the Canadian Border Patrol was “suspicious” that he didn’t have a driver’s license or flight itinerary with him, but “ultimately, they allowed him to continue,” according to the complaint.
At the airport in Toronto, Borgwardt said he bought a flight to Paris.
On the plane, Borgwardt said he searched for news in Green Lake and saw “something about the missing kayaker and believes that his plan had worked,” according to the complaint.
After he landed in Paris he flew to a country in Asia, the complaint said.
An unidentified woman picked him up and they went to a hotel where they stayed for a couple of days, the complaint said.
Borgwardt was later in an apartment, according to a video he made for law enforcement.
No one else is facing charges, the sheriff said.
Asked if Borgwardt will be required to reimburse the county for the money spent on the search, Podoll told reporters, “That’s part of the restitution that we present to the court.”
(NEW YORK) — Public health officials are continuing to monitor an outbreak of avian influenza, also known as bird flu, as it spreads across the U.S.
The strain, known as H5N1, sickened several mammals this year before infecting dozens of Americans, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
There is no evidence of person-to-person transmission of bird flu, and the risk to the general public is low, the CDC said.
But public health experts have also said it’s important to be alert during the respiratory virus season and to be aware of risks that could come from exposure to infected animals and from drinking raw milk.
Here’s the latest information on the outbreak in the United States:
What is the status of the bird flu outbreak? Avian influenza, or bird flu, is an infectious viral disease that primarily spreads among birds and is caused by infection with Avian Influenza A viruses.
These viruses typically spread among wild aquatic birds but can infect domestic poultry and other bird and animal species, according to the CDC. In the U.S., the virus infected dairy cows.
“What’s made this year’s outbreak interesting is the association with dairy cows, which is not an association that’s been seen before,” Michael Ben-Aderet, an infectious disease physician and associate director of hospital epidemiology at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, told ABC News.
“H5N1 has been known for many, many years. It’s not a new strain of bird flu, but we haven’t seen it cross over into dairy cows and have this association with dairy cows and dairy workers,” he continued.
As of Thursday, 58 human cases have been confirmed in seven states, according to CDC data. California has the highest number of cases with 32.
Almost all confirmed cases have had direct contact with infected cattle or infected livestock.
So far, all bird flu cases in the U.S. have been mild, and patients have all recovered after receiving antiviral medication.
“There has been another strain in Canada that caused really severe disease in a teenager who ended up in critical condition in the hospital,” Dr. Meghan Davis, an associate professor of environmental health and engineering at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, told ABC News. “So yes, these [strains] are highly related, but not quite the same.”
What are the risks associated with raw milk? In April reports emerged of bird flu fragments found in samples of pasteurized milk.
However, the fragments are inactive remnants of the virus; they cannot cause infection because the commercial milk supply undergoes pasteurization.
“The good news is that pasteurization inactivates [the virus], and so, when you do that test to look at fragments of the virus, although we find it in milk, the pasteurization process ensures that live virus is not transmitted,” Albert Ko, an epidemiologist at the Yale School of Public Health, told ABC News.
However, the Food and Drug Administration has previously warned of the possible dangers associated with drinking raw, unpasteurized milk due to elevated risks of foodborne illness.
On Tuesday, all of Raw Farm’s raw whole milk and cream products that were still on store shelves in California were being voluntarily recalled by the company, following multiple detections of bird flu virus in its milk and dairy supply within the past week, according to public health officials.
The CDC said it considers exposure to raw milk without personal protective equipment a “high-risk exposure event.”
“Raw milk consumers need to be aware that even handling the product itself could be a kind of exposure,” Davis said. “So, if you’re pouring it, you spill a little milk, get that on your hands, touch your eyes. You could get the same kind of exposure as someone who works in a dairy farm.”
Are we at risk of a bird flu pandemic? Experts said the U.S. is currently not experiencing a bird flu pandemic, nor is the country presently at risk of a bird flu pandemic.
However, they said with each new human case, it offers a chance for the virus to mutate, theoretically enabling human-to-human transmission to occur at a point in the future.
“I think the warning sign is just, because there’s so much transmission in birds and there’s transmission now in our cattle, particularly we really are concerned about the possibility that there may be a mutation that enables person to person or human-to-human transmission,” Ko said.
Ben-Aderet said there is also concern as the U.S. heads into the winter respiratory virus season that the seasonal flu — which has the ability to exchange parts of its genome with other influenza viruses — could do the same with bird flu.
Health officials are taking proactive measures to prevent such a situation from occurring.
The World Health Organization announced in July that it has launched an initiative to help accelerate the development of a human bird flu vaccine using messenger RNA technology.
In October, federal health officials announced they are providing $72 million to vaccine manufacturers to help ensure available non-mRNA bird flu vaccines are ready-to-use, if needed.
There are currently no recommendations for anyone in the U.S. to be vaccinated against bird flu.
ABC News’ Youri Bendjaoud contributed to this report.
Members of the New York Police Department discuss a shooting in Queens, New York, at a press conference on Jan. 2, 2025. Via NYPD.
(NEW YORK) — Ten people were shot after several men opened fire at a group of people waiting outside of a music venue in Queens, New York, the New York Police Department said in a press conference early on Thursday.
Officers received reports of several people shot at an event space in Queens at 11:18 p.m. Wednesday evening, Chief of Patrol Philip Rivera said.
Ninety people were inside the building, which was at capacity, Rivera said. There was a line of about 15 people waiting outside to enter the space when three to four males approached and opened fire.
Ten people were shot, all between the ages of 16 and 20, Rivera said. Six of injured are female and four are male, he said. They were taken to area hospitals with non-life-threatening injuries. Police said they believe that at least 30 shots were fired in the direction of the group.
The male suspects fled on foot and drove away in a sedan with out of state plates, police said.
Authorities are investigating whether the shooting was gang related. This was not a terrorist attack, Rivera said.
