The FBI officially confirmed Friday the San Bernardino, California, shootings were being investigated as an act of terrorism.
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USA media outlets are reporting that Tashfeen Malik, 27, posted a private message to herself on Facebook pledging her allegiance to the leader of the IS jihadist group Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi.
Wednesday’s shooting in San Bernardino is the deadliest in the US since the 2012 massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, where Adam Lanza, 20, gunned down 20 children and six teachers before shooting himself to death.
“We don’t know if this was the intended target or if there was something that triggered him to do this immediately”, said David Bowdich, assistant director of the FBI’s Los Angeles office.
Officials are now combing through a “very large volume of electronic evidence” that the shooters, Syed Rizwan Farook and Tashfeen Malik, tried to hide from law enforcement, Comey said.
While the attack may have been inspired by Islamic State, there is no evidence that it was directed by the militant group, U.S. government sources said.
Relatives said Farook traveled to Saudi Arabia to meet his wife.
Malik and Farook left behind a 6-month-old daughter. The pair killed 14 people in a rampage Wednesday afternoon.
Farook, a U.S. citizen born in IL, was the son of Pakistani immigrants, said Hussam Ayloush, head of the Los Angeles area chapter of the Muslim advocacy group Council on American-Islamic Relations.
“I looked at Britney Spears on Facebook and I hate Britney Spears”, he said. The post, under a different name, was taken down a short time later, Williams said of the post uncovered by the FBI in the course of its ongoing investigation.
After entering the Inland Regional Centre in San Bernardino, where Farook worked, the murderous duo sprayed bullets inside a conference room.
He said investigators had found an additional 5,000 rounds of ammunition at the couple’s home along with 12 pipe bombs and bomb-making material.
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“Preliminary information indicates that these were people that came prepared, that they were dressed and equipped in a way to indicate that they were prepared”, San Bernardino Police Chief Jarrod Burguan said.
