WASHINGTON — A man clad in black who was obsessed with President Barack Obama pulled his car within view of the White House at night and fired shots from an assault rifle, cracking a window of the first family’s living quarters while the president was away, authorities said about their still-developing investigation.

The U.S. Secret Service found two bullets had hit the White House and agents caught up with Oscar Ramiro Ortega-Hernandez in Pennsylvania on Wednesday after a four-day search. Police arrested the 21-year-old Idaho man at a hotel after a desk clerk recognized his picture. Ortega was scheduled to make his first appearance today in federal court in Pittsburgh and many questions remained about his motive and background.

The White House declined to comment.

Authorities are investigating the man’s mental health and say there are indications he believed attacking the White House was part of a personal mission from God, according to a law enforcement official who spoke with The Associated Press. There are also indications the man had become obsessed with Obama and the White House, according to two officials.

Shots were fired at the building Friday night. Agents discovered Tuesday that one of the two bullets hit the exterior and a second cracked a window on the second floor residential level, just behind the rounded portico visible from the south side of the White House.

That bullet was stopped by protective ballistic glass. The window that was hit is in front of the so-called Yellow Oval Room, which is in the middle of the family’s living quarters.

Obama and his wife Michelle were on a trip to California and Hawaii at the time of the shooting. The president has since traveled on to Australia on a nine-day Asia-Pacific tour.

Investigators believe Ortega fired the rifle from his vehicle Friday, according to an official with knowledge of the investigation. Gunshots were reported that night on Constitution Avenue about 9:30 p.m. Soon after, U.S. Park Police found an abandoned vehicle, the assault rifle inside it, near a bridge leading out of the nation’s capital to Virginia. The car led investigators to Ortega, and they obtained a warrant for his arrest Sunday, officials said.