SAN ANTONIO (Reuters) – A U.S. Army soldier was arrested after police found him in a motel room near Fort Hood, Texas, with possible "bomb-making materials," authorities said on Thursday.
FBI Special Agent Eric Vasys said the soldier, who was absent without leave from Fort Campbell, Kentucky, was being held in a jail in the city of Killeen, Texas near Fort Hood, on an unrelated child pornography charge.
He was identified as Naser Jason Abdo, 21, originally from the Dallas area. He disappeared from Fort Campbell over the July 4 weekend, Fort Campbell base spokesman Bob Jenkins said. The FBI initially gave his name as Jason Abdo Nassar.
"Whatever threat Mr. (Abdo) posed yesterday or up until yesterday has been eliminated and mitigated, and there was nothing to indicate he was acting with anyone else," said FBI agent Vasys, who is based in San Antonio.
He did not elaborate on the apparent threat, or what charges Abdo might face. Vasys said he had no knowledge of any other arrests of soldiers.
A spokesman for Fort Hood said there had been no incidents on the base and the security alert at the facility had not been raised.
Abdo was arrested on Wednesday after a "concerned citizen" reported that he had firearms and smokeless gunpowder in his motel room in Killeen, Vasys said.
"A search of his motel room revealed that he had some components which could be considered bomb-making materials," Vasys said.
A press conference on the arrest was scheduled for 2 p.m. central time at the Killeen, Texas police department.
Abdo could be charged as early as Thursday in federal court, Vasys said.
In June, the U.S. military approved Abdo as a conscientious objector to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, but that status was put on hold after he was charged with child pornography in Kentucky.
Abdo applied for conscientious objector status in 2010 after he decided Islamic standards would prohibit his service in the U.S. Army in any war, military officials said.
Fort Hood was the scene of a shooting rampage that killed 13 people and wounded 32 others on November 5, 2009. U.S. Army psychiatrist Major Nidal Malik Hasan was charged in the shootings and is expected to face a court martial in March, 2012.
(Additional reporting by Tim Ghianni in Nashville and Chris Baltimore in Houston; Writing by Karen Brooks; Editing by Greg McCune and Jackie Frank)
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