Officials including President Barack Obama and San Bernardino Police Chief Jarrod Burguan have said it may have been motivated by extremist ideology but that no concrete information has emerged suggesting ties to Islamic State or other militant groups.
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In now-deleted posts, Malik expressed her admiration for ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi on Facebook using an alias, a Facebook spokesperson confirmed to Mashable.
They had left their 6-month-old daughter with Farook’s mom before they went off to commit mass murder, police said.
CNN, citing law enforcement sources, said Farook had been “radicalised” and had been in touch through telephone and social media with more than one worldwide terrorism suspect who was being investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Tashfeen Malik made the post under an account with a different name, the officials told U.S. media.
A friend of shooting victim Nicholas Thalasinos told The Associated Press that Farook had a heated conversation about Islam two weeks before the attack.
Thalasinos’ wife, Jennifer, described her husband as a “very devout believer”, the Los Angeles Times reported.
Meanwhile, Reuters reported that Pakistani intelligence has contacted Malik’s kin about Wednesday’s mass killing.
Syed Rizwan Farook and his wife, Tashfeen Malik, appear to have planned the deadly rampage in San Bernardino on Wednesday on their own, without assistance from a broader terrorist cell in the U.S., FBI Director James Comey said Friday.
The couple shot between 65 and 75 rounds during a holiday party at the Inland Regional Center, and they fired 76 shots at police hours later.
Little is known about Malik’s background prior to her meeting Farook. There is no limit on the amount of ammunition USA citizens can purchase and keep in their homes, and police discovered hundreds more rounds when the couple were killed in a shootout with police. “It is possible that this was terrorist related, but we don’t know”, he said yesterday morning.
They point not only to the sheer amount of weaponry left unused, but also to the fact that the couple’s rented SUV was due to be returned on Thursday. Farook was a health technician for the San Bernardino County Health Department and 12 of the 14 fatalities were county employees, as were 18 of the 21 people who were injured.
Farook and Malik had an infant daughter, who was left with her grandmother before the shooting took place.
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Investigators found two relatively new, but smashed, cellphones in a garbage can near one of the crime scenes, law enforcement officers told CNN. “Radical Islamic terrorism”, Trump told reporters.
