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Law enforcement provides an update on the New Year’s Day cybertruck explosion and possible connections to the suspected terror attack in New Orleans.
The driver of the Tesla Cybertruck that blew up outside Trump International Hotel Las Vegas on New Year’s Day has been identified as 37-year-old Matthew Alan Livelsberger, a U.S. Army service member from Colorado, U.S. officials said.
Livelsberger was shot in the head in what police believe was a self-inflicted gunshot prior to the detonation of the vehicle, police said.
Authorities used his tattoos, along with his credit cards, military identification and passport, to identify him at the scene.
“There are two tattoos, one of which was on the stomach and one of which is on the arm that we can see bits and pieces of it, as in comparison to what it is that we now know he had, on his body,” Sheriff Kevin McMahill of the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department said Thursday.
“That has given us a lot of confidence that this is, in fact, the same person, as well as of which the clearly obvious, which is the credit cards, the military identification, the passport,” he added.
1 DEAD, 7 INJURED AFTER TESLA CYBERTRUCK EXPLOSION OUTSIDE TRUMP HOTEL IN LAS VEGAS: POLICE
Matthew Livelsberger poses in an undated photograph. (Fox News)
Las Vegas police gained assurance that Matthew Livelsberger was a person of interest in the explosion of a Tesla Cybertruck in Las Vegas on Wednesday, using forms of identification found in the truck, as well as a tattoo on his arm. (Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Press Conference)
The 37-year-old recently returned from an overseas assignment in Germany and was on approved leave at the time of the incident, according to a U.S. official.
He had served in the Army since 2006, rising through the ranks.
“Master Sgt. Matthew Alan Livelsberger enlisted as an 18X and served in the active duty Army from January 2006 to March 2011. Livelsberger then joined the National Guard from March 2011 to July 2012, followed by the Army Reserve from July 2012 to December 2012. He entered the active duty Army in December 2012 and was a U.S. Army Special Operations Soldier,” an Army spokesperson confirmed to Fox News.
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He was awarded a total of five Bronze Stars, including one with a valor device for courage under fire, a combat infantry badge and an Army Commendation Medal with valor.
He deployed twice to Afghanistan and also served in Ukraine, Tajikistan, Georgia and Congo, the Associated Press reported.
Matthew Livelsberger seen in a photograph. (Fox News)
There has been speculation online over his political affiliations, but no confirmed reports of how he voted.
Livelsberger’s uncle, Dean, told The Independent that he “loved Trump.”
“He loved Trump, and he was always a very, very patriotic solider, a patriotic American,” Dean said. “It’s one of the reason he was in Special Forces for so many years.”
INVESTIGATORS USE TATTOO, PHOTOS TO IDENTIFY SUSPECT BEHIND CYBERTRUCK EXPLOSION AT TRUMP HOTEL
Livelsberger appears to have at one point been married to Sara Livelsberger, a 38-year-old who lives in Delray Beach, Florida. The Denver Post reported that he had divorced in 2018 and remarried in 2022.
Fox News Digital has reached out to Sara Livelsberger for comment.
A Facebook page for Sara has been quiet since 2016, but makes multiple references to Livelsberger as her husband.
In Facebook posts from 2016, Sara said she was a registered Democrat and shared images that were disparaging of President-elect Trump.
The Cybertruck was rented in Colorado, authorities said during a Wednesday news conference.
The futuristic Tesla vehicle was complete with large firework mortars in the back and fuel canisters. It arrived in Las Vegas at about 7:30 a.m. local time Wednesday and drove up and down the strip before pulling into the Trump hotel.
The vehicle was parked for about 20 seconds before it exploded, police said.
Authorities are continuing to investigate whether the incident was an act of terrorism, which came just hours after another U.S. veteran killed at least 15 people when he plowed a truck with an Islamic State flag down Bourbon Street in New Orleans.
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Authorities are still working to determine a motive.
“It’s not lost on us that it’s in front of the Trump building, that it’s a Tesla vehicle, but we don’t have information at this point that definitively tells us or suggests it was because of this particular ideology,” said Spencer Evans, the Las Vegas FBI’s special agent in charge.
Fox News Digital’s Greg Wehner and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Sarah Rumpf-Whitten is a breaking news writer for Fox News Digital and Fox Business.
Story tips and ideas can be sent to sarah.rumpf@fox.com and on X: @s_rumpfwhitten.
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