() Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen said the suspect in a deadly bar shooting is still considered armed and dangerous as a manhunt continues.
Michael Brown, 45, a U.S. Army veteran, is accused of killing four people at the Owl Bar in Anaconda, Montana, on Friday. The victims were identified as bartender Nancy Lauretta Kelly, 64, and patrons Daniel Edwin Ballie, 59; David Allen Leach, 70; and Tony Wayne Palm, 74.
Speaking with on Wednesday, Knudsen said Brown remains a threat to the community.
“Anybody who is willing to walk into an establishment at 10:30 am in the morning and gun down an entire coffee crowd, we have to be concerned about his state of mind,” Knudsen said.
Authorities have been searching for Brown in a section of forest southwest of Anaconda. The lack of progress with the search has sparked some frustration among residents in nearby counties, prompting the Granite County Sheriff’s Office to respond.
In a social media post, Sheriff Rico Barkell asked residents to go about their everyday routines, writing, “I do not have any inkling that Michael Paul Brown is in Granite County. If the situation changes, I will be sure to be transparent and put out information that is needed.”
Knudsen told that the challenging forest terrain has made the search difficult.
“We’ve got a lot of people talking online, chitty-chatting on social media. ‘Why aren’t you doing this?’ ‘Why are you just doing this?’” Knudsen said. “This is unmanaged national forest. The undergrowth and deadfall in here is tremendous.”
According to Knudsen, the forest is so thick that authorities have to comb carefully through the timber so as not to potentially miss Brown.
“The sentiment from a lot of the tag teams who have been in there is that if he wanted to curl up in a ball and hide under some of this undergrowth. They’d have a hard time seeing him unless they literally stepped on him,” Knudsen said.
While Knudsen acknowledged there is a possibility that Brown may be dead, he said that is not the stance authorities are taking at this time.
