SEATTLE - Police in Tacoma on Wednesday began investigating a possible link between the Washington, D.C.-area sniper shootings and Western Washington.
Late Wednesday afternoon Tacoma Police sectioned off a backyard in Tacoma and were searching it using metal detectors and chain saws, which could be seen on video footage first captured by KING 5 News.
Investigators were cutting up pieces of a stump in the yard for reasons which were not immediately clear.
Ballistics and other evidence connected Tuesday's shooting of a bus driver in Maryland to the fatal shootings of nine other people and wounding of three in the Washington, D.C. area, said Michael Bouchard of the federal bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms.
The search in Tacoma was being conducted in the 3300 block of South Proctor Street near the Tacoma Mall, a quiet residential neighborhood.
FBI agents in Seattle acted after investigators in the D.C.-area shootings called asking them to check it out.
More to come.