1 Dead In Vegas Strip Explosion

(CBS/AP)  Las Vegas police are studying surveillance video for clues in the death of a man in a parking garage outside the Luxor hotel-casino.

Two people walked into the garage around 4 a.m., reports CBS station KLAS-TV. One person was a male, and police say he noticed a strange device sitting on his vehicle. When he tried to remove it, the device exploded.

Police said it was a small explosion but the man was injured and later died at an area hospital. The person with the victim, police say, was not harmed and is being questioned.

Police said the blast behind the Luxor hotel-casino was directed at the man, who worked at a business inside the pyramid-shaped hotel, and was not a terrorist act or a mob hit. Police did not identify the victim or the person who was with him.

Investigators were reviewing hotel surveillance videotapes for clues.

"We believe the victim of this event was the intended target," police spokesman Bill Cassell said. He denied initial reports that a backpack had exploded, and dismissed suggestions that the slaying had ties to organized crime.

Cassell said no threat was made against the Luxor or its employees.

The man who was killed "worked inside the Luxor, but we do not think he was on the hotel payroll," he said. He characterized the slaying as "a homicide with an unusual weapon," but declined to describe the device.

Gordon Absher, a spokesman for MGM Mirage Inc., which owns the Luxor, said the person killed was not a company employee.

"Police do not believe the resort was targeted in any way," Absher said, adding that the Luxor was not damaged and that — except for the top floor of the two-story parking garage — the resort was continuing normal operations.

There was little damage around the vehicle and the hotel was not evacuated, police and a hotel official said.

Entrances were sealed after the explosion and authorities went vehicle to vehicle with bomb-sniffing dogs. People were allowed to remove their vehicles after they had been inspected, Absher said.

The explosion happened in the parking garage behind the Luxor, a hotel at the south end of the Las Vegas Strip, a main road where many of the city's casinos are located.

Federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives agents were involved in the investigation, said ATF Special Agent Nina Delgadillo, regional spokeswoman for the agency in San Francisco.

[gunnerv1]

Can anyone say that they have been personally affected by any new new/old Homeland Security Act OTHER than haveing to wait longer to get on an Airplane (and that's a good thing)? I have yet to talk to anyone with a personal story about this. Therefore it is my thought that your all full of sh*t when you whine about some freedom that has been taken away. How are/were you affected. Come on Liberals, your being called onto the carpet.

[mainemade]

Man, he ticked of the wrong someone.

[jolsonbear]

Ohhh please people...there are no terrorist in Las Vegas....they are all still safe and sound in the White House.

[nolalou]

lawandorder6,

From the article (which may have been updated since you made your comment), the item was left by someone on the hood of his car. That's why he picked it up, to move it before he got in his car. Apparently, he was the intended target of someone trying to kill him. Since we don't know much else yet, we cannot assume it was a terrorist act, much less that it was done by any extremist group.

[rushman71]

If some person wants to blow someone up, why not go to Iraq or Iran? Do it over there not here.

[capnboost]

New information:
http://www.mercurynews.com/news/ci_5837894

It wasn't a backpack. It's being investigated as a "Homicide w/ an unusual weapon"

Collateral damage was very minimal. There have been *no* suggestions that it's "terror" related.

What did I say before? "Lets not jump to conclusions"

[hazelknows]

Perhaps a late mailing from the bishop

[buildmypc]

All muslims are guilty before innocent to Americans because they are trying so hard to have it that way. Now,back to this subject you muslim lover. This is most likely someone stealing chemicals and they mixed prematurely. BUSH !!! raise the terror alert !!! You republican idiots.

[ubikvalis2]

"Hopefully, this is not Taliban or Al Queda related. "

I'm sure the Bush administration thinks otherwise, because then they can go invade some oil-rich Muslim nation that had nothing to do with it.

[jimibear]

"Too random and inexcessible for a terroist event.. (unless perhaps a test run)..

Look more for a disgruntled customer or former employee.
Posted by ne_patriot7 at 11:49 AM : May 07, 2007
+ report abuse"

Possibly ... also possibly, this guy was the one who packed the explosive and was taking it somewhere to do some real damage, and it went off early by mistake.