NY police are searching for a man in connection with a bombing in Manhattan over the weekend.
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Ahmad Khan Rahami vowed to martyr himself rather than be caught after setting off explosives in NY and New Jersey, and he’d hoped in a handwritten journal championing jihad that “the sounds of bombs will be heard in the streets”, federal terrorism charges lodged against him Tuesday alleged.
U.S. police found multiple improvised explosive devices in New Jersey, one of which detonated, the Federal Bureau of Investigation said Monday as investigators probed three attacks carried out on United States soil in one day.
Crime scene investigators work at the scene of Saturday’s explosion in Manhattan’s Chelsea neighborhood, in New York, Sunday, Sept. 18, 2016.
During the inquiry, the father backed away from talk of terrorism and told investigators that he simply meant his son was hanging out with the wrong crowd, according to the official, who was not authorized to discuss the investigation and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.
Authorities zeroed in on him as the potential bomber after a fingerprint and DNA obtained from one of the NY sites and “clear as day” surveillance video from the bombing scene helped identify him, according to three law enforcement officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the case.
That issue arose after the Orlando massacre in June, when FBI Director James Comey said agents a few years earlier had looked into the gunman, Omar Mateen, but did not find enough information to pursue charges or keep him under investigation.
“We have every reason to believe this was an act of terror”, New York Mayor Bill de Blasio said after the arrest. He said he and his family were in a state of shock following last weekend’s blasts, which injured 31 people. The race was cancelled and no one was injured.
William Sweeney, the FBI’s assistant director in NY, said on Monday that that at the time of the bombing, Rahami was apparently not on the FBI’s radar. A police officer went to investigate and recognized the man as Rahami, police and the mayor said. An unexploded pressure-cooker bomb was found blocks away – with Rahami’s fingerprints on it and his face captured by a nearby surveillance camera, according to the court complaints.
We did a traffic stop of a vehicle of interest in the investigation.
“A bomb exploding in New York is obviously an act of terrorism, but it’s not linked to worldwide terrorism”, Democratic New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said Sunday after touring the scene of the explosion in Chelsea.
The New Jersey device contained evidence of a black powder explosive.
Earlier Sunday, a team of five Federal Bureau of Investigation agents searched an Uber driver’s vehicle that had been damaged in the Manhattan blast, ripping off the door panels inside as they examined it for evidence. “You didn’t know if was coming from the subway beneath you, you didn’t know if there were other bombs, you didn’t know where to go”.
While officials said the events had not been linked to global terrorism, the security threat put residents, police and security personnel on high alert as three explosions took place over the weekend but did not cause any fatalities.
San Jose, California-based eBay Inc. noted that the products are legal and widely available and said the company had worked with law enforcement on the investigation.
Tannerite is often used in target shooting to mark a shot with a cloud of smoke and small explosion. It was described by a law enforcement official as a pressure-cooker with protruding wires and a cellphone attached to it.
In a separate appearance, de Blasio said New Yorkers should be prepared to see a large increase in police presence across the city.
In New Jersey on Saturday, a pipe bomb exploded in a trash can on the route of a Marine Corps run before the start of the race, causing no injuries but forcing its cancellation.
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The blasts also came on the same day as IS said one of its “soldiers” was responsible for a stabbing rampage that wounded at least eight people at a shopping centre in Minnesota.
