San Bernardino Terror Attack: Prosecutors to Charge Couple's Neighbor
Prosecutors announced this week that they will be pursuing criminal charges against the neighbor and alleged friend of the couple who carried out a mass shooting in San Bernardino, California earlier this month.
Federal prosecutors said that 25-year-old Enrique Marquez could face charges as early as this week.
According to the New York Times, Marquez reportedly purchased two assault rifles used by Syed Rizwan Farook and Tashfeen Malik in the December 2 attack that left 14 people dead and 17 people injured.
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Marquez has reportedly informed authorities of Farook's progressive radicalization, as well as admitted to purchasing the rifles for Farook because he did not think Farook would pass a background check.
Authorities are also reportedly investigating whether Marquez, who converted to Islam years ago, had any involvement in alleged terror plot in 2012 that was ultimately abandoned.
According to USA Today, the owner of Morgan's Tavern, Marquez's place of employment, described the young man as "emotionally immature" but not dangerous.
"He was a goody, goody two shoes type kid," Morgan said. "If anybody was talking about sleeper cells, if I had any suspicion he was a weirdo, I would have fired him."
FBI director James Comey also announced this week that contrary to previous reports, the suspects involved in the December 2 attack did not openly share messages of Islamic extremism on social media prior to the attack.
Previous reports had suggested that the FBI had missed public calls for jihad in the U.S. posted by Frook and Malik, but Comey says that all of the couple's messages were sent privately and there is "no evidence of posting on social media."
"I see no indication that either of these killers came across our screen, tripped any trip wires," Comey said in a statement this week, adding that the FBI did not pick up anything that "should have put them on our screen."
In reference to the types of messages sent by the couple, Comey said: "I'm talking about the kinds of messages that billions, trillions are sent every day," adding "We don't intercept the communications of Americans without predication."
President Barack Obama is expected to visit the survivors of the shooting this Friday in California.
When previously discussing the victims killed in the shooting, the president said: "Each of them served their fellow citizens and all of them were part of our American family."
White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest confirmed that the president will visit the victims while en route to spend his Christmas vacation in Hawaii with his family.
"While he is en route to Honolulu, the president will stop in San Bernardino, California to visit privately with the families of the victims of the terror attack in San Bernardino earlier this month," Earnest said.
