Jihadi bride led the way at party massacre: Tashfeen Malik opened fire first as her husband hesitated, report reveals – amid claims that she ‘wore the pants’ in the marriage

 

  • Tashfeen Malik, 29, is thought to have radicalized husband Syed Farook
  • ISIS announced on radio that the couple were followers of the terror group 
  • Witnesses described how Malik shot first in the attack that killed 14  
  • Family members in her native Pakistan said she used to wear Western dress but switched to a burka after going to university
  • Relatives said she also began posting extremist material on Facebook and spoke in Arabic to a mystery caller late at night 
  • Others said family were influential and known to have extremist links
  • Investigators say Malik left a post on a Facebook page using an alias pledging allegiance to ISIS and its leader al-Baghdadi 
  • President Obama insisted today that the US ‘will not be terrorized’ 

Jihadi bride Tashfeen Malik shot first during the San Bernardino massacre, a report has revealed, as the FBI investigates claims she was responsible for radicalizing her husband.

Witnesses have told The Sunday Times how Malik, 29, had been the first to open fire on her husband’s co-workers at a government department holiday party, while Syed Rizwan Farook, 28, appeared to ‘hesitate’.

Intelligence sources fear Malik may have been a terrorist who traveled to the U.S. to marry Farook with the sole purpose of carrying out a deadly attack.

Scroll down for video 

The pair married in August of last year after the California native traveled to Saudi Arabia and brought her back to the US

Malik (left) met husband Syed Farook (right), 28, though a dating website and the pair married in August of last year after the California native traveled to Saudi Arabia and brought her back to the US

Malik’s relatives describe how she turned from the Westernized daughter of a rich family to burka-wearing jihadi bride after she appeared to have become radicalized while studying pharmacology at Bahauddin Zakariya University in the city of Multan, Pakistan.

After two years of attending the university, starting in 2007, she began posting extremist statements on Facebook, her relatives said, adding that it was a cause of concern for her family.

According to the LA Times, a relative of Mailk’s in Pakistan, who asked not to be named, said Malik would stay up late chatting to someone in Arabic.

‘She started taking part in religious activities and also started asking women in the family and the locality to become good Muslims,’ they said. ‘She started taking part in religious activities of women in the area.

‘She used to talk to somebody in Arabic at night on the internet. None of our family members in Pakistan know Arabic, so we do not know what she used to discuss.’

Malik met Farook on an online dating site and the couple married last year in Islam’s holy city of Mecca in Saudi Arabia, according to Farook’s co-workers.

She arrived in the U.S. wearing a hijab and accompanied by her then husband-to-be and his mother, on July 27 last year on a fiancee visa.

She was described as having a strong influence over her husband and was said to ‘wear the pants’ in the relationship.

Candles burn before dawn at a growing makeshift memorial at Waterman Avenue and Orange Show Road near the Inland Regional Center, in San Bernardino, California, to honor the victims of the shooting

Candles burn before dawn at a growing makeshift memorial at Waterman Avenue and Orange Show Road near the Inland Regional Center, in San Bernardino, California, to honor the victims of the shooting

A Los Angeles police officer helps a mourner light a candle for the 14 people killed by Malik and Farook, during a United We Stand vigil at Granada Hills Charter High School on December 5

A Los Angeles police officer helps a mourner light a candle for the 14 people killed by Malik and Farook, during a United We Stand vigil at Granada Hills Charter High School on December 5

The FBI is investigating the theory that she may have targeted shy Farook, who listed his interests on his iMilap.com profile as ‘hanging out in the backyard doing target practice’ and ‘working on vintage and modern cars, reads religious books’, in a terrorist ‘honeytrap.’

As he was both religious and experienced with guns, Isis leaders may have circled him as an ideal jihadi candidate for radicalization, while his US citizenship would allow Malik into the country

By the time her flight from Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, arrived at Chicago’s O’Hare airport the FBI and US Department of Homeland Security had already carried out background checks but had found no indicators of terrorist activities.

When they met, American-born Farook was a well-liked officer for his county’s health department, checking food surfaces at restaurants.

Malik, who was 27 and a year older than her husband when they married, was very religious and conservative.

A co-worker of Farook’s described the rapid change in him after the wedding.

‘I think he married a terrorist,’ Christian Nwadike, told CBS This Morning, explaining that the mild-mannered man he thought he knew was different upon his return from Saudi Arabia last year.

Nwadike told CNN that he believes Farook was ‘set up’ to commit the massacre through his marriage to Malik.

Another friend from the mosque, Abdul Aziz Ahmed, also said Farook stopped attending the mosque following his wedding, and said his radical behavior was completely out of character.

The lifeless body of gunman Syed Farook, with his hands cuffed behind his back, is seen lying face down on the ground next to a large pool of blood in the wake of Wednesday evening's gun battle with police

The lifeless body of gunman Syed Farook, with his hands cuffed behind his back, is seen lying face down on the ground next to a large pool of blood in the wake of Wednesday evening’s gun battle with police

The husband and wife unleashed a barrage of bullets on officers, who returned fire – and hit their rental Ford Expedition SUV (pictured) with 380 rounds on Wednesday

Above, an officer looks over the evidence near the remains of a SUV involved in the police shootout in San Bernardino, California

Above, an officer looks over the evidence near the remains of a SUV involved in the police shootout in San Bernardino, California

‘He was looking good, he seemed good (after returning from Saudi Arabia),’ Ahmed told CNN. ‘But then he disappeared (after the wedding).’

The couple’s former landlord at North Center Street, Doyle Miller, 81, also said Malik may have been behind the atrocity.

‘She did not like to be seen,’ he told The Sunday Times. ‘She did not seem to like people around here. He seemed ordinary, no worries for me at all. I’m only now thinking that maybe she wore the pants. It could be that she was behind it all.’

Nada Bakos, a former CIA analyst who specialized in tracking al-Qaeda, said that if Malik had been the operational leader in the attack, it could be ‘a game changer’ for the West.

At 10.30am on the day of the attack, Farook had walked out of his office, at the Inland Regional Centre, San Bernardino, to return home to pick up his wife as part of a carefully orchestrated plan.

The couple left their six-month-old baby with Farook’s mother, telling her they were popping out to a doctors appointment.

Instead, they returned to the health department dressed in black and wearing tactical vests, carrying AR-15-style assault rifles, 9mm pistols and more than 1,600 rounds of ammunition.

Witnesses say Farook appeared to hesitate, possibly daunted by the idea of killing his co-workers or trying to find Massianic Jew Nicholas Thalasinos, 52, who he was said to have argued with that morning.

His wife Malik took the first shot, opening fire at a group who were gathered around a Christmas tree.

Some dived for cover and hid beneath tables, while the lucky ones fled to safety.

Details about the lives of Farook and Malik before they opened fire at a holiday party for San Bernardino County employees were scant, and they were not on any terrorist watch lists before the attack 

Details about the lives of Farook and Malik before they opened fire at a holiday party for San Bernardino County employees were scant, and they were not on any terrorist watch lists before the attack

Hours after journalists entered the couple's home, attorneys for Farook's family revealed information about Malik, saying many of the men in the family had never spoken to her and she wore a burka

Hours after journalists entered the couple’s home, attorneys for Farook’s family revealed information about Malik, saying many of the men in the family had never spoken to her and she wore a burka

Farook and Malik died in a shootout with police hours after the massacre in San Bernardino on Wednesday. Above, media and neighbors enter their boarded-up apartment

Farook and Malik died in a shootout with police hours after the massacre in San Bernardino on Wednesday. Above, media and neighbors enter their boarded-up apartment

Farook joined his wife in the shooting and as the left, they tried to detonate a remote-controlled bomb which failed to explode.

Fourteen people were murdered in the shooting, and another 21 were injured – making it the deadliest terrorist attack inspired by Islamic extremism on US soil since September 11.

Authorities discovered that Malik had sworn allegiance to Isis and its leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi,on Facebook moments before the attack. The profile was quickly removed from public view and its contents reported to law enforcement.

The couple fled the offices in a rented 4×4 and were able to avoid the police for four hours before they were finally tracked down.

Witnesses say Farook had been driving while Malik crouched in the back seat and fired at police through the shattered back window.

They also threw a pipe bomb at the tailing police cruisers before police caught up and the pair were killed in a gun battle.

A former CIA officer told The Sunday Times that the pair’s ability to calmly murder people so easily indicated they may have had ‘at least some degree of training, possibly in Pakistan’.

David Bowdich, assistant director of the FBI’s Los Angeles office, said on Friday that the shooters attempted to destroy evidence, including crushing two cell phones and discarding them in a trash can.

The FBI chief also had established that there were ‘telephonic connections’ between the couple and other people of interest in FBI probes.

The couple were armed with a .223-caliber DPMS Model A15 rifle, a Smith and Wesson M&P15 rifle as well as Llama handgun and a Smith and Wesson handgun (pictured)

The couple were armed with a .223-caliber DPMS Model A15 rifle, a Smith and Wesson M&P15 rifle as well as Llama handgun and a Smith and Wesson handgun (pictured)

An additional 1,400 rifle rounds were found inside the bullet-riddled vehicle the pair used to evade police on Wednesday. Police also recovered more than 2,000 handgun bullets

An additional 1,400 rifle rounds were found inside the bullet-riddled vehicle the pair used to evade police on Wednesday. Police also recovered more than 2,000 handgun bullets

A black and yellow duffel bag stuffed with home-made pipe bombs was recovered from a California home linked to suspects Syed Rizwan Farook and his wife Tashfeen Mali

A black and yellow duffel bag stuffed with home-made pipe bombs was recovered from a California home linked to suspects Syed Rizwan Farook and his wife Tashfeen Mali

He said of the possibility that Malik radicalized her American husband, ‘I don’t know the answer, whether she influenced him or not. Being a husband myself, we’re all influenced to an extent. But I don’t know the answer’.

Meanwhile friends have revealed that they knew Farook by his quick smile, his devotion to Islam and his talk about restoring cars.

Farook was born in Chicago on June 14, 1987, to parents born in Pakistan. He was raised in Southern California.

Those around him say they didn’t know he was busy with his wife building pipe bombs and stockpiling thousands of rounds of ammunition for the assault on Farook’s colleagues from San Bernardino County’s health department.

Speaking at the Dar Al Uloom Al Islamiyah-Amer mosque, where Farook worshiped, assistant teacher Roshan Abassi said that Malik ‘dressed modestly and didn’t show her face’.

‘He [Farook] hasn’t come to our mosque for a while, it’s been around a month,’ Abassi said ‘Even if she [Malik] would come, I couldn’t see her because she was modestly dressed, she didn’t show her face.’

According to Fox News, it is believed that on at least one of Farook’s two trips to Saudi Arabia in 2013 and 2014, one or both of the spouses reached out to suspected members of al Qaeda.

The LA Times reported that police sources said Farook also had some form of contact Al Nusra Front, an Al-Qaeda backed group in Syria, as well as al Shabaab in Somalia.

Thousands came out to honor the victims of the San Bernardino massacre at several vigils held in California on Thursday night

Thousands came out to honor the victims of the San Bernardino massacre at several vigils held in California on Thursday night

Above, mourners visit a makeshift memorial for the victims of the attacks near the Inland Regional Center on Friday 

Above, mourners visit a makeshift memorial for the victims of the attacks near the Inland Regional Center on Friday

People hold candles as they attend a vigil at the San Manuel Stadium to remember those injured and killed during the shooting at the Inland Regional Center

People hold candles as they attend a vigil at the San Manuel Stadium to remember those injured and killed during the shooting at the Inland Regional Center

A woman holds a sign for Robert Adams, who died in a shooting on Wednesday, during a vigil on Thursday

A woman holds a sign for Robert Adams, who died in a shooting on Wednesday, during a vigil on Thursday

Sources have told Daily Mail Online that US officials communicated with their Pakistani counterparts about connections between Malik and the Red Mosque in Islamabad, which is known for radicalism.

It was at the center of a bloody siege in 2007 as fundamentalists clashed with security forces for eight days.

Relatives of Malik in Pakistan, estranged from their wealthy family members who live in Saudi Arabia, said she used to wear Western-style clothing but later switched to more traditional garments such as a burka, which covers the the entire body.

Saudi Arabia requires the wearing of a hijab, but does not mandate burkas. Pakistan, where Malik returned to study at Bahuddin Zakri University in Multan, does not have a dress code for women.

Malik’s paternal aunt, Hafza Batool, told the BBC that the family was in shock.

‘She was so modern. I do not know what had happened to her. She brought a bad name to our family,’ Batool said.

According to the Times, Malik’s Pakistani relatives speak Urdu, the country’s national language, alongside a more specialized local dialect named Saraiki.

Dr. Nisar Hussain, a professor at Bahauddin Zakariya University who used to teach Malik confirmed that, while attending classes, she used to wear a veil and described her as ‘religious’.

Hifza Batool, 35, said that the wealthier part of Malik's family is estranged from poorer relatives in Pakistan, and that the longtime Saudi resident became more conservative in her dress three years ago

Hifza Batool, 35, said that the wealthier part of Malik’s family is estranged from poorer relatives in Pakistan, and that the longtime Saudi resident became more conservative in her dress three years ago

Above, the locked house of Malik's family in the village of Kahror Pakka, near Layyah Pakistan

Above, the locked house of Malik’s family in the village of Kahror Pakka, near Layyah Pakistan

She was also highly intelligent, he added, at one point achieving the top grade in her class, but said she never appeared radicalized to him.

Hussain said: ‘Yes, she was religious, but not an extremist. She never tried to influence the class in the name of religion, never.’

Others added that Malik’s family were politically influential and known to have connections to extremist Islam, especially in Karor Lal Esan, where they were from.

Meanwhile Hifza Batool, 35, Malik’s step-uncle, said: ‘I recently heard it from relatives that she has become a religious person and she often tells people to live according to the teachings of Islam.’

Batool said that he had not ever actually met Malik because, ‘Tashfreen Malik’s parents are rich and we are poor and they don’t like to meet with their poor relatives’.

Investigators looking into the attack at the San Bernardino disability center where Malik and her husband opened fire are now looking into the massacre as an act of terrorism.

Terrorist group ISIS announced in an online radio broadcast that two of their followers had carried out the attack in San Bernardino on Wednesday before dying in a shootout with police.

‘Two followers of Islamic State attacked several days ago a center in San Bernardino in California,’ the group’s daily broadcast al-Bayan said.

Those who knew the couple said that Malik voluntarily did not drive and would not speak to male relatives. Above, a photo from Malik’s license

Relatives of San Berandino massacre shooter Tashfeen Malik said that the Pakistan-born woman used to wear Western dress but started wearing more conservative Muslim clothes three years ago. Above, a Pakistan identification card for Malik

US government sources have said that there is no evidence the attack was directed by the militant group, nor that the organization even knew who the attackers were.

How the couple became radicalized enough to open fire at a holiday party for San Bernardino County employees is still unknown, though some suspect that Malik may have pushed her husband towards extremism.

Intelligence agencies are said to be investigating Malik’s alleged ties with the infamous Red Mosque in Islamabad.

Last year the mosque’s preacher Maulana Abdul Aziz told a Pakistani newspaper that he supported the mission of ISIS, though he had no connections to the terror group.

The FBI said that neither member of the couple were on terrorist watchlists, and a source close to the Saudi government told ABC News that officials in the kingdom were also not monitoring Malik.

Malik came to the United States in July 2014 on a Pakistani passport and a fiancée visa, authorities said. She and Farook were married in California that August.

To get the visa, immigrants submit to an interview and biometric and background checks – screening intended to identify anyone who might pose a threat.

Attorneys representing the couple’s family, Mohammad Abuershaid and Daniel Chesley, said Malik wore a burka, didn’t speak to male relatives and her in-laws had never seen her face. 

Abuershaid said that family members saw Malik as a ‘very private’, soft-spoken and caring housewife. He added that Malik spoke broken English.

Officials have shared information about Malik’s possible connection to the Red Mosque in Pakistan, where radical cleric Maulana Abdul Aziz (pictured in 2014) used to preach

‘They were very traditional. When family would come over, the women would sit with the women and the men would sit with the men, so the men had never spoken to her,’ Abuershaid said. ‘[Malik] wore a burka, so she was never seen by the men.’

He said that very little is known about Malik and her family, who are believed to be in Saudi Arabia.

‘She was a very, very private person. She kept herself isolated and she was very conservative,’ Chelsey added. ‘Because everyone knows so little, she’s easy to pin things to.’

Malik studied to be a pharmacist in Pakistan, but did not work in the field in the United States, where she instead lived as a housewife with she and Farook’s six-month-old baby.

It was revealed Friday that Malik, the wife and accomplice of San Bernardino shooter Farook (pictured), pledged allegiance to the leader of ISIS on Facebook during or right before Wednesday's deadly attacks

It was revealed Friday that Malik, the wife and accomplice of San Bernardino shooter Farook (pictured), pledged allegiance to the leader of ISIS on Facebook during or right before Wednesday’s deadly attacks

She also chose not to drive voluntarily, Abuershaid said.

When their baby was born six months ago, the couple decided to name her according to the Arab convention rather than the traditional Pakistani way.

They reportedly told Farook’s mother that they were headed to a doctor’s appointment when they left the child with her before the attack.

FBI agents who searched the couple’s home found it was filled with family photographs, Qurans and other books on Islam in what appeared to be a normal suburban family residence

Among the photos found in the two-story town house are a series of young women and a California State University identity card belonging to Farook.

The attorney added that Farook’s mother lived in the upstairs area of the couple’s home and did not have knowledge of the planned attack on Wednesday.

He said he had spent some time speaking with Farook but claimed conversation was limited to pleasantries.

‘He would say hello, how are you, what’s up, what are your future goals,’ he explained.

Fellow worshipper Nasser Shehata said he spoke to Farook regularly and described him as ‘very quiet and shy’.

‘He worked in the area but he lived in Riverside,’ he said. ‘He was a very quiet person, on the shy side. He prayed and he would leave.

‘Two years [ago] he went to Saudi Arabia and married his wife but he didn’t get radicalized there.

‘Six months ago, he was very happy when his daughter was born and he looked forward to having a life with his daughter. Something changed in the last six months.’

Nizaaam Ali, an acquaintance of Farook, told CNN that Farook never spoke of Malik and rarely spoke of their child – not even announcing the baby’s birth.

Ali said Farook would come for the noon prayer each day during his lunch break from work.

Malik reportedly left a post on an account under a different name aligning herself with Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi (pictured), the leader of ISIS in the Middle East

‘He was such a sweet young man,’ Ali told CNN. ‘Everyone who knew him always talked so highly of him. Until today. To try and understand this, it’s really difficult for us.’

Ali was one of the 300 people that attended the wedding of Farook and Malik in August 2014 at the mosque.

However he said Farook ‘never’ brought his wife him to pray, because he would come from work, and when Ali did see Malik, she was always completely covered by a niqab.

‘I wouldn’t have been able to tell the color of her eyes even,’ Ali told CNN. ‘Was she skinny, was she fit? I don’t know. I never saw her. (Farook) never described her. He never said anything about her.’

At this stage in the investigation, officials say it appears the couple were inspired by ISIS, rather than expressly ordered to carry out the attacks.

Some investigators believe Malik and Farook were self-radicalized, but it is also possible that someone may have motivated them.

Malik was from the Layyah district in southern Punjab province, the officials said.

Abdul Aziz Ahmed, like many who knew Farook, are struggling to understand his actions.

‘He came to the mosque every day for two years. How can this happen, a guy who was very good?’ Ahmed said. ‘You didn’t hear him talking about those mad men, these terrorists.’

In July 2010, Farook was hired as a seasonal public employee and served until December of that year, according to a work history supplied by San Bernardino County. In January 2012, he was rehired as a trainee environmental health specialist before being promoted two years later.

When asked to explain possible motivations for the attack, Chesley said at the news conference on Friday that co-workers made fun of Farook for his beard and said he was isolated with few friends.

Farook’s older sister, Saira Khan said that when she first saw the news broadcast that identified her brother and his wife as the suspected gunman, that she thought they had ‘the wrong person’.

An acquaintance of Farook, Nizaam Ali, said he knew nothing about Farook’s wife and knew little about the couple’s child born six months ago and was named in Arab rather than Pakistani fashion

Syed Rizwan Farook (pictured), 28, who is US-born, was described by coworkers and friends as quiet. Those around him had no idea that he could be involved in a possible attack or that he was stockpiling weapons

She said in a sit-down interview with MSNBC that she went through phases of ‘shock’ and disbelief’ that her ‘introvert’ brother would do such a thing.

‘I had absolutely no idea that they were involved in anything like that, or that they were even capable of doing something like this,’ Khan said.

She added that her government-worker brother who opened fire at a holiday party was far from the brother that she knew.

‘The brother I grew up with, the shy introvert, kept-to-himself, quiet kid that we knew, grew up and got married,’ she said.

As for Farook’s wife, however, Khan said she didn’t know much about Malik or her past.

‘His wife was recently here. She was only here for two years,’ Khan told MSNBC. ‘We didn’t really know her that well.’

She added, however, that she never saw anything that would suggest that they could be radicalized.

WHO IS ABU BAKR AL-BAGHDADI? SHADOWY ISIS LEADER REVEALED

Tashfeen Malik, 27, reportedly made a bayat, or pledge of allegiance, to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi (right) – the shadowy leader of ISIS who has declared a worldwide caliphate and himself the leader of all Muslims.

He has called on all Sunni Muslims to join him – ISIS also wants to eradicate Shia Muslims – and expects a final apocalyptic showdown with the armies of ‘Rome’ (The West) in Dabiq, a small town of Megiddo near Aleppo in Syria.

Currently in ISIS territory, the terror group will defeat Western armies in Dabiq and this battle will, in turn, start the countdown to the end of the world, according to al-Baghdadi’s ideology

The 44-year-old has been a life-long cleric after attending the Islamic University in Baghdad, and rose to prominence as a senior figure of Al Qaeda in Iraq during the American occupation.

After AQI morphed into ISIS, al-Baghdadi took over as leader following the death of his predecessor Abu Omar al-Baghdadi. 

Khan said in separate interview with CBS News this morning that it was ‘mind-boggling’ to her that her brother and his wife would do something like this.

Her husband, Farhan Khan, tearfully said that he was having a hard time forgiving his brother-in-law for the carnage he caused.

He also said they begun the legal process to adopt Farook and Malik’s orphaned baby daughter, who is currently with Child Protective Services.

Family members knew that Farook owned guns, but believed he kept them locked up, Abuershaid said, adding that the Farook’s family is in complete shock.

The attorneys said they sat through four hours of questioning with Farook’s family members by the FBI and said nothing was found that showed the family knew of the attacks.

‘There was nothing linking this to religion or terrorist activity,’ Chesley said. ‘They’re the FBI and they’re damn good at receiving this information.’

He also said on Friday that it was unfair to blame the attacks on radical Muslims when attacks on Planned Parenthood facilities and abortion clinics are not blamed on extremist Christians.

Both Chesley and Abuershaid said they had seen the FBI’s evidence and are not convinced the pair were directly linked to foreign terror groups.

Chesley said: ‘When a Christian goes to shoot up a Planned Parenthood or an extreme Catholic goes and bombs an abortion clinic, all the headlines do not say ‘extremist radical Christian, Catholic, Christian, Catholic’… just like right now every headline is saying Muslim.

‘There is a tendency to take a cookie cutter version or paradigm of a terrorist type event and superimpose it on a situation just because that person is of Muslim belief or Muslim tradition.

‘I do not think we should jump to too many conclusions in particular because I think we need to protect the Muslim community.’

In fact, it is believed that Planned Parenthood shooting suspect Robert Lewis Dear, 57, was an evangelical Christian, rather than a Catholic.

A university ID shows Syed Rizwan Farook with a fuller beard than in his driving license photo. There are claims that his wife radicalized him after he married her in Saudi Arabia and brought her to the US

Syed Farook’s business card identified him as an environmental health specialist for the San Bernardino County Department of Public Health

Challenged over the remarks by journalists who pointed out that it was the FBI themselves who announced their investigation is linked to terrorism, Abuershaid hit back.

He said: ‘I think every investigation the FBI does when it’s involving a Muslim will involve some kind of terrorist investigation.’

THE VICTIMS

On Thursday, San Bernardino County sheriff’s department released the full list of the 14 people who died. They are:

Bennetta Bet-Badal, 46, Rialto 

Aurora Godoy, 26, San Jacinto 

Isaac Amanios, 60, Fontana 

Larry Kaufman, 42, Rialto 

Harry Bowman, 46, Upland 

Yvette Velasco, 27, Fontana

Sierra Clayborn, 27, Moreno Valley 

Robert Adams, 40, Yucaipa 

Nicholas Thalasinos, 52, Colton 

Tin Nguyen, 31, Santa Ana 

Juan Espinoza, 50, Highland 

Damian Meins, 58, Riverside

Shannon Johnson, 45, Los Angeles 

Michael Wetzel, 37, Lake Arrowhead  

The attorneys said the FBI will continue their investigation through Monday and Tuesday.

‘[Motive] has been very hidden. I guess we’re all wanting justice, and we’re all wanting to know anyone affiliated with [the attack]. We need to be protective and respectful of everyone’s freedom of religion,’ Chesley said, suggesting that this could be a case of a disgruntled worker.

Chesley noted the number of bullets found in the couple’s home, and said that as a gun owner, this was not unusual.

‘As Americans, we all want to protect one another and live in a safe and secure society,’ he said. ‘As a gun owner, I probably have at least 4,000 or 5,000 rounds of bullets in my house.’

But Comey noted there’s still ‘a lot evidence that doesn’t quite make sense’.

Farook and Malik had illegally modified their two AR-style rifles making it easier to kill a large number of people, officials revealed today.

Meredith Davis, with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, said that while the weapons were purchased legally, they had undergone a number of illegal adjustments afterwards.

One of the weapons had been modified to allow it to fire on fully-automatic mode, while the other was fitted with a large magazine and had the ‘bullet button’ removed to allow for quicker reloading.

In total, Farook and Malik were carrying four guns – the two rifles and two semi-automatic handguns – and were in possession of 12 pipe bombs and around 4,500 rounds of ammunition.

California law bans the sale of weapons with magazines holding more than 10 rounds of ammunition, but it is not known how many bullets the weapons used in this week’s attack could hold.

Saira Khan, Syed Farook’s sister, and her husband, told CBS This Morning that they were shocked at heartbroken at the carnage caused by their relative and his wife

Farhan Khan (left), brother-in-law of San Bernandino shooter Syed Farook, says his relative had a ‘normal’ family life and was not a religious radical

She had two brothers and two sisters and was related to Ahmed Ali Aulak, a former provincial minister.

After living in Saudi Arabia, she returned to Pakistan five or six years ago to complete a degree from Bahauddin Zakariya University in Multan.

An online transcript from Bahauddin Zakariya University uncovered by Daily Mail Online on Friday shows Malik scored 74.88 out of 100 on one of her pharmacy exams.

She was also listed as being in the fourth year of a D Pharm degree in 2014, although she may not have completed it.

One of Malik’s uncles, Javed Rabbani, said Malik’s father, Gulzar, changed while the family was living in Saudi Arabia.

‘When relatives visited him, they would come back and tell us how conservative and hard-line he had become,’ Rabbani said in an interview with Reuters.

The father had built a house in Multan, where he stays when he visits Pakistan, according to another uncle, Malik Anwaar.

He said Gulzar had a falling-out long ago with the rest of the family, citing a dispute over a house among other matters. ‘We are completely estranged,’ Anwaar said.

Rabbani said he had been contacted by Pakistani intelligence as part of the investigation into the San Bernardino shooting.

A photo from an album found on the premises of the Redlands, California, residence shows what appears to be a birthday celebration attended by young women and girls, most of them wearing Western dress

Among the heap of images discovered in Farook’s home was a family portrait (left) showing a husband, wife and three young children in formal wear, as well as a photo of two unnamed men (right), an older and a younger one, that may have been taken at a wedding

 

Leave a Reply