FBI Director James Comey said the investigation into Sunday morning’s massacre in Orlando, Fla., revealed “strong indications of radicalization by this killer” who was likely at least partly influenced by outside influences.
Comey said a federal terrorist investigation was ongoing, which is warranted by what he’s seen so far.
“The reason for that is there are strong indications of radicalization by this killer, and of potential inspiration by foreign terrorist organizations,” he said.
Comey said the shooter, Oman Mateen, who killed 49 people and was shot dead early Sunday, was twice investigated by the FBI. The last time when his name surfaced “in an indirect way” during a July 2014 investigation into someone else. After examining the matter and interviewing Mateen, agents “turned up no ties of any consequence” to terrorist organizations then.
“I don’t think” that investigators should have done anything differently during either investigation, Comey said, but pledged to revisit the query in a “transparent” manner.
Comey said trying to stop lone-wolf attacks is like “looking for needles in a nationwide haystack.”
Previously, the FBI probed the suspected murder’s life for 10 months after co-workers reported concerning statements, and even deployed confidential informants to get him to open up, Comey said. That inquiry was closed after investigators didn’t find any ties between the suspect and known terrorist groups, he said.
As to the current “federal terrorism investigation,” Comey said “so far we see no indication that this was a plot from directly outside the United States,” nor that he was “part of any network.”
Investigators are also studying which terrorist group’s agenda he hoped to further with his plot.
In a 911 call he made during his rampage, he swore fealty to the self-proclaimed Islamic State. However, he also referenced the Boston Marathon bombers and a Florida suicide bomber who blew himself up in the Middle East in the name the Al-Nusra Front, a Syrian-based Sunni terrorist group.
His inconsistency “adds a little bit to the confusion about his motives,” Comey said.
The FBI is also examining the extent to which gay bigotry motivated him, Comey said.
In May 2013, co-workers reported that the contract courthouse security guard claimed family connections to al Qaeda and membership in Hezbollah, a Shia Muslim group that opposes the Sunni Muslim-led Islamic State.
He told co-workers that he wanted police to raid his home and “assault his wife and child so that he could martyr himself,” Comey said.
Comey repeatedly refused to name the suspect, noting lone-wolf killers are often motivated by the idea of earning fame with their heinous acts “and I don’t want to be a part that.”
