MONROE, Mich. -- A newly-released 911 call revealed chilling details of a targeted car bomb attack that left a father and his two sons seriously injured in southeastern Michigan, as police and federal authorities worked through new leads Thursday into the violent incident.
"We have a bad accident," victim Erik Chappell told a 911 responder during a call he made from the scene on Tuesday. "My car blew up with two kids. You've been called on it already, but I'm telling you what is going on with my boys."
AP
An apparent car bomb injured a man and his two young sons in Michigan Tuesday.
"I've got two significant leg injuries," he added. "They are chewed up pretty good."
Chappell, 42, an attorney, was driving with his two sons, aged 11 and 13, when the blast occurred around 5:40 p.m. local time Tuesday. They were on their way to a football practice, the Detroit Free Press reported.
The father-of-four apparently dragged his sons from the Volvo station wagon just before it became engulfed in flames. Witness Edwin Holly, a security guard for a nearby marina, told The Free Press he saw the car explode "like it was a James Bond movie."
All three were taken in serious condition to St. Vincent Mercy Medical Center just across the Ohio border in Toledo.
Chappell was discharged Wednesday, the Toledo Blade reported, but his sons reportedly sustained more serious injuries and remained in the hospital.
Investigators believe the bomb was strategically placed on the vehicle to inflict as much damage as possible, indicating that the attack was targeted and malicious.
Sources told The Monroe Evening News that Chappell -- a divorce attorney with a practice in Sylvania, Ohio, who was also involved with many high-profile Monroe County cases -- had been receiving threats.
"This was not an intent to injure; this was an intent to kill," a family friend, who declined to be identified, told The Evening News.
Several law enforcement agencies, including the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and Michigan State Police, are investigating the incident. The ATF is offering a $10,000 reward for information in the case.
"We got a ton of leads," Special Agent Donald Dawkins of the ATF said late Wednesday. "We have some serious directions that we're going toward, but none that I can say are concrete."
Monroe is about 35 miles southwest of Detroit.
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