Who Is Draylen Mason? Austin Porch Package Bombing Victim Is 17-Year-Old

Police in Austin, Texas, on Tuesday identified the 17-year-old victim of a series of deadly package bombs that exploded Monday. Draylen Mason was killed after he opened a package that was sent to him.

Authorities have launched a massive manhunt for the bomber, whose porch package bombs killed two people and severely injured two others since March 2. The name of a 75-year-old woman wounded in a second incident Monday is yet to be released.

Austin Police Chief Brian Manley on Tuesday described Mason as an "outstanding young man who was going places with his life." He was killed when a package on the porch of his Texas home exploded Monday morning. It exploded inside the kitchen, and Mason's mother was also injured in the incident, but was currently in stable condition, authorities said.

Since the series of deadly package bombs, Austin police received over 250 calls about suspicious packages, Manley said Tuesday.

"What caused this in these instances was a suspicious package that no one was suspecting or expecting," Austin Mayor Steve Adler said Tuesday. "I want everyone in my community, if they see something that's suspicious — a package or otherwise — I want them to pick up the phone and call 911."

Police chief Manley also said the three package bombs were constructed with a "certain level of skill" and authorities hope it would yield more clues about the mysterious porch bomber.

"What we do know is that the individual or individuals involved in this, these suspects, they do have a certain level of skill to be able to construct a device like this and then deliver that device to your target without having it explode, either during construction, or during delivery, does take a certain level of sophistication," Manley said.

The first of Monday's explosions occurred in the early hours, killing Mason and wounding his 40-year-old mother, both African-Americans. Hours later, authorities were informed about a second blast that injured a 75-year-old Hispanic woman, who was taken to a hospital with potentially life-threatening injuries.

Authorities said there was high possibility both these explosions were linked to a March 2 blast that killed a black man, who was identified as 39-year-old Anthony Stephan House.

There have been several reports suggesting the incident may be linked to hate crimes as all the victims of the blasts so far were minorities.

"We are not ruling anything out at this point," Manley said at a news conference Tuesday. "We are just not going to ignore that fact that the three victims that were targeted ... were all people of color."

"We cannot ignore that. That is something we have to pay attention to. That does not indicate that it's a hate crime. But we're not going to rule that out because we don't want to limit anything that we're considering," Manley added.