NEW SWEDEN, Maine, May 5 (UPI) -- Investigators awaited an autopsy Monday on the sole identified suspect in the deadly arsenic poisoning in a rural Maine church.
Police said there was a "definite link" between the man found shot to death Friday and the poisoning that left one parishioner dead and 15 others sick.
Officials declined to immediately confirm that Daniel Bondeson, 53, left a suicide note or whether he died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
Bondeson, a substitute teacher and potato farmer, was found shot to death late Friday at his home near New Sweden, where arsenic in coffee at the Gustaf Adolph Lutheran Church resulted in the death of Walter Reid Morrill, 78.
Both men were parishioners at the church in rural northern Maine's potato farming country.
Investigators collected "a number of items" from Bondeson's home, reportedly including what the Boston Herald described as an "apologetic suicide note."
Police declined to classify the death as a suicide pending the results of Monday's autopsy.
Maine State Police Lt. Dennis Appleton also declined to say Bondeson was responsible for the poisoning, but said the shooting scene was "definitely linked to the poisoning."
Investigators, meanwhile, planned to continue taking DNA and fingerprint samples from parishioners to help identify or rule out potential suspects, state police spokesman Steve McCausland said.
While authorities have yet to disclose a possible motive for the poisonings, they said they were following several unspecified theories.
Morrill, an usher at the church, died a week ago after drinking arsenic-laced coffee following Sunday services at the church April 27.
Bondeson reportedly had not attended the meeting where the tainted coffee had been served.
Some 200 people including Gov. John Baldacci turned out this past Sunday at the church for services normally attended by about 50 people.
"The entire state stands with you," the governor said. "We are here to stand with you, pray with you.
