Former Agent: Corrupted Data Hampers Jan. 6 Pipe Bomb Probe

Corrupted geolocation data from a cellphone provider has hampered the investigation into pipe bombs being placed outside the Republican and Democrat headquarters in Washington the day before the Jan. 6, 2021, protests outside the U.S. Capitol.

Steven D’Antuono, a former assistant director in charge of the FBI’s Washington Field Office who led the pipe bomb investigation, said agents saw in surveillance video what appeared to be a smartphone in the suspect’s hand, prompting them to pursue photo data in the area, The Washington Times reported.

“There’s a lot of phone data that came in. … It looks like a phone [on the video]. Was it a real phone? Not a real phone? Was it a ruse?” D’Antuono said in closed-door testimony earlier this month to the members of the House Judiciary Committee, including chair Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, and the House Administration Committee chair, Rep. Barry Loudermilk, R-Ga.

The Washington Times reported that it reviewed a transcript of the testimony.

“We don’t know until we find the person and ask them those questions,” D’Antuono said.

The investigation into the pipe bombs left on Jan. 5, 2021, outside the offices of the Democratic National Committee and the Republican National Committee in Washington has continued without a break. The FBI boosted its reward from $100,000 to $500,000 for information leading to an arrest, the Times reported.

D’Antuono said the FBI did a geofence of the area to capture cellphone data, but the agents obtained incomplete data because some of it was corrupted by one of the providers. D’Antuono said he could not recall which carrier had the corrupted data.

He did not suspect foul play in corrupting the data and said it was “an unusual circumstance that we have corrupt data from one of the providers.”

The suspect was caught on surveillance video wearing a sweatshirt with a hood pulled up. The suspect was wearing Air Max Speed Turf shoes with a yellow Nike logo, a backpack, and gloves. The individual was recorded walking through Capitol Hill neighborhoods carrying what federal investigators said at the time were two live pipe bombs.

D’Antuono said a report from the FBI laboratory in Quantico, Virginia, determined the pipe bombs “could explode and they could cause harm or death.” Asked if he thought the bomb could detonate 17 hours later, D’Antuono said he did not think it was possible.

“I don’t know when they were supposed to go off. Maybe they weren’t supposed to go off. … We honestly don’t know,” he said.