Montana News Roundup UPDATE: 4 Dead in Anaconda Bar Shooting

Sunday PM Update

A combined task force continues the search today for Michael Brown, the man wanted for killing a bartender and three patrons in the Owl Bar on Friday morning.

Attorney General Austin Knudsen announced today there is an initial $7500 dollar reward for tips to leading to Brown's apprehension. He also said there has been "tremendous cooperation" and support from federal law enforcement agencies assisting with the search.

The focus continues to be in the woods and mountainous areas west of Anaconda.

Saturday AM UPDATE:
Authorities continue their search for Michael Brown in the Stumptown Road area west of Anaconda. They’ve also confirmed the victims are the bartender and 3 patrons and that Brown lived next door to the Owl Bar.

The entire town of Anaconda has been on lockdown since late morning, as law enforcement searches for the suspect believed to have been involved in a shooting at a local bar with multiple victims.

Information is still developing, but we know the shooting happened at the Owl Bar at the east end of Anaconda at midday. There's been no official word on the number of victims, but it appears there are multiple fatalities.

Montana Highway Patrol reported law enforcement was looking for the suspect west of town. There had been reports that the shooter may have fled toward Georgetown, but the Granite County Sheriff reported there were no current threats to residents on that side of the county line. Granite County also said SWAT teams had checked the suspect's home, but he remained on the loose just before 2 pm.

Anaconda Deer Lodge County Law Enforcement is identifying the suspect as Michael Paul Brown, and advising residents to stay out of the Stumptown area west of Anaconda, and call 9-1-1 rather than approach the suspect, who is considered armed and dangerous.

     The Montana Division of Criminal Investigation is being called in to head the investigation.

Big fire near Polson

CSKT Division of Fire says firefighters have been able to "catch" a big lighting fire that had burned up to 6-hundred acres overnight near Polson. The Buddha fire was burning in open areas, but CSKT Fire says no homes or property are being threatened.

      Nearly all the National Forests reported multiple fire starts from last night's storms. But most of the blazes were under 10-acres and have been extinguished, or are being monitored.

Slow storms bring flooding

In Great Falls, it wasn't fire, but water that was the problem. Several streets turned into rivers in the heavy downpour from the slow-moving thunderstorms.

The downpour didn't set a record for Great Falls, but it did in Missoula. The National Weather Service said there was over 9-tenths of an inch of rain Thursday, eclipsing a record that had held since 1946.

Montana Public Radio keeps operating

The Corporation for Public Broadcasting is pulling the plug on operations, announcing it will close at the end of September after the Trump administration cut more than a billion dollars in funding.

However, it doesn't appear that it will mean "dead air" for NPR fans here in Montana. Sources tell us the Montana Public Road will continue to operate, in large part because of a recent fundraiser that netted over half-a-million dollars from supporters. However, we'll have to see what programming changes may develop if the NPR content comes to an end.