ASHEVILLE — A Florida man arrested Friday in connection with the string of pipe bombs sent to prominent politicians and public figures attended Brevard College and had other North Carolina ties.

Law enforcement officials in Florida placed Cesar Sayoc in custody Friday and expected to charge him in connection with a sweeping investigation of 12 bomb-like devices addressed to prominent Democrats, according to the Department of Justice.

More:What we know about the 14 suspicious packages

On an account hosted on LinkedIn — a career-oriented social media site — Sayoc wrote that he attended UNC Charlotte and Brevard College between 1980 and 1984. He said he studied business, finance, economics and biology.

Sayoc, 56, claimed, on the same LinkedIn page, to be a "veterinary medicine graduate 2021 from High Point Univ."

Colleges confirm links

Sayoc completed three semesters at Brevard College, where he played soccer, between 1980 and 1981, but he didn't graduate, spokeswoman Christie Cauble said. At the time, the college offered only two-year degrees, Cauble said.

Buffie Stephens, a spokeswoman for UNC Charlotte, confirmed a student named Cesar Sayoc attended the college for one academic year — from 1983-84.

Sayoc played soccer on UNC Charlotte's men's team, but he didn't graduate from the school, Stephens said.

On LinkedIn, which acts as an online résumé of sorts, Sayoc wrote that his grandfather was a plastic surgeon in the Philippines who "perfect the conversion oriental eye to Americanize [sic]."

In the same biographical passage about his family, Sayoc mentioned several times that his family members had helped overthrow communists — though he wasn't clear about when or where.

Sayoc was born in Brooklyn, New York. Records show he has a criminal history dating back more than two decades, including a 2015 arrest in Broward County, Florida, for alleged petty theft and probation violation.

Sayoc's arrest record

Sayoc was arrested near an auto store in Plantation, Florida. Police examined a white van covered in stickers, covered the vehicle with a blue tarp and took it away on the back of a flatbed truck.

The stickers included images of President Donald Trump, American flags and what appeared to be logos of the Republican National Committee and CNN, though not all the images were clear.

Records show Sayoc has a history of arrests dating back to at least the early 1990s. In 2002, Sayoc was charged with threatening to “throw, project, place, or discharge any destructive device," according to online court records from Miami-Dade County.

More recently, Sayoc was arrested in May 2015 after he was accused of stealing a briefcase and a garment bag from Walmart, according to a West Palm Beach Police report.

Devices put nation on alert

The nation has been on heightened alert in the wake of bomb-like devices addressed to high-profile Democrats and supporters, including former President Barack Obama, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and former Vice President Joe Biden.

The total number of devices addressed to prominent Democrats reached at least a dozen Friday after two more suspicious packages were recovered, one in Florida addressed to New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker and the other in New York addressed to former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper.

A package addressed to Clapper was recovered at a Manhattan postal facility. Like some of the previous packages, the one found in New York City on Friday had the office of Florida Democratic Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz as the return address, a photo obtained by CBS News showed.

USA Today contributed to this report.