More charges were expected to be brought against Rahami in federal court.
Advertisement
Ahmad Rahami had previously been charged with five counts of attempted murder after a shootout with cops.
The new federal charges include use of a weapon of mass destruction, bombing, destruction of property and use of a destructive device.
Ahmad Khan Rahami is taken into custody after a shootout with police Monday, Sept. 19, 2016, in Linden, N.J.
In the complaints, prosecutors said Rahami ordered citric acid, ball bearings and electronic igniters on eBay and had them delivered to a Perth Amboy, New Jersey, business where he worked until September 12. Family court records show Rahami also worked for a security firm in Parsippany, New Jersey, in 2008.
Surveillance video shown on CNN and other USA television broadcasters shows a man believed to be Rahami dragging a bag big enough to hold the pressure cooker bomb used in the explosion before Saturday night’s blast in Manhattan.
The Chelsea explosion came from a “high explosive charge” placed inside a pressure cooker and left in a dumpster.
The United States was shocked by multiple explosive devices found over the weekend in two states.
An unexploded pressure cooker was packed with similar components, including a cell phone that would act as a timer.
12 fingerprints were recovered from the device on 23rd Street – all 12 matched Rahami.
One bloodstained section contained references to both Anwar al-Awlaki, the American-born cleric who was killed in a 2011 drone strike and whose preaching has inspired other acts of violence, and Nidal Hasan, the former Army officer who went on a deadly shooting rampage in 2009 at Fort Hood, Texas.
“The notebook found on Rahami closes with the following chilling passage, “[God willing] the sounds of the bombs will be heard in the streets. An Afghan immigrant wanted in the bombings was captured Monday after being wounded in a gun battle with police.
The FBI said Tuesday it assessed Rahami’s activities in 2014 after his father told agents he was concerned about his son’s possible involvement with extremists.
The FBI interviewed Rahami’s father in 2014 after a violent domestic dispute.
However, there are contradictory accounts of how Rahami came to the attention of law enforcement. His father told reporters that he contacted the Federal Bureau of Investigation and expressed his concern after the dispute.
The FBI tried to check out the father’s story, and conducted what officials now describe as an “assessment” of that information.
Investigators said the suspect injured two officers when he fired on them after he was found asleep in a doorway.
Rahami worked as an unarmed night guard for two months in 2011 at an Associated Press administrative technology office in Cranbury, New Jersey, the wire service reports. He filed the paperwork in 2011 and it was approved in 2012. However it’s unclear if she came to the United States at that time.
On a trip to Pakistan in 2014, Rahami emailed his local congressman seeking help because his pregnant wife had an expired passport.
At that time, he told immigration officials he was visiting family and attending his uncle’s wedding and renewing his Pakistani visa. It is unclear what happened to the child.
The news comes hours after law enforcement sources say the suspect’s father alerted authorities about his son’s potentially destructive path. “Hopefully that means he had nowhere to go”, O’Neill told CBS News.
“I would like people to respect my family’s privacy and let us have our peace after this tragic time”, she wrote.
The charging documents lay out a wide swath of evidence pointing to Rahami as the bomber.
She provided no other details on her relationship with Ahmad Khan Rahami, except to say she last spoke to him by phone in January.
Advertisement
When officers responded, Rahami pulled out a handgun and opened fire, striking an officer in his protective vest over his chest. During his time in the region, Ahmad Rahami married Asia Bibi and the two had a child together, law enforcement sources said.
