Family lawyers say no proof Calif. shooters tied to terror groups

At a news conference Friday afternoon, attorneys for Farook’s family expressed sorrow for the victims and provided details on the family’s home life leading up to the killings. But there is no sign anyone from the Islamic State communicated with Malik or provided any guidance for the attack on a San Bernardino social service center, which left 14 people dead and 21 wounded.

But investigators are exploring Farook’s communications with at least one person who was being investigated for possible terror connections.

“Once the residents have the apartment and we’re not involved any more, we don’t control it”, he said. He also declined to rule out that future possibility.

“The investigation so far has delivered indications of radicalization by the killers and of potential inspiration by foreign terrorist organizations”, Federal Bureau of Investigation Director James Comey told reporters in Washington.

“There is no indication that these killers are part of an organized larger group or form part of a cell”.

The attorneys said Farook’s family never saw the two assault rifles, thousands of ammunition rounds or 12 pipe bombs that authorities found in the house.

Farook himself was also a loner, his family’s attorneys said. He would not elaborate.

The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity under regulations, identified the school Monday as the Al-Huda International Seminary.

Farook was born in the U.S., Burguan said, and had been working with the county for five years.

Tashfeen Malik, 27, a native of Pakistan who lived in Saudi Arabia for more than 20 years, and her US-born husband, Syed Rizwan Farook, 28, were killed in a shootout with police.

A private TV channel reported late Friday night that Ms Malik had links with Maulana Aziz of the Lal Masjid in Islamabad.

“We did a very thorough search and took our time and completed it”, she said.

If that turned out to be the case, Obama said in a radio address, it would underscore a long-recognized threat: “the danger of people succumbing to violent extremist ideologies”. The couple’s 6-month-old child is now in the care of child protective services, but the family is trying to gain custody of her, the attorneys said.

“Until there is absolute clear evidence, every headline doesn’t have to say “Muslim massacre” or ‘Muslim shooters, ‘” said David Chesley, a lawyer for the family of Syed Farook, part of the husband-wife team allegedly behind the attack.

“You left your six-month-old daughter”, Khan said.

Farook had no criminal record, and neither he nor his wife was under scrutiny by local or federal law enforcement before the attack, authorities said.

An informed Saudi Arabian source confirmed that the perpetrators of the recent mass shootings in San Bernardino, California, did not meet in Saudi Arabia, adding that Saudi Arabia “receives hundreds of pilgrims who are American citizens yearly, and they return to the United States without being radicalised or harmed ideologically”.

Others have done so. In May, just before he attacked a gathering in Texas of people drawing cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad, a Phoenix man tweeted his hope that Allah would view him as a holy warrior.

“This operation comes after the bloody Paris attacks, which were carried out by fighters from the state… which caused the killing of dozens, and after a martyrdom-seeking operation on presidential security in the centre of the Tunisian capital”, it said. Investigators are looking into ties between the couple and terrorist elements in the US and overseas, including the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria.

Farook’s mother lived in the rented townhouse with the couple, but even she did not claim to know Malik.

“Rahim, Saira and Eba, the brother and sisters of the alleged shooter, had no idea to the point when they got word that there was an incident that had taken place”, Chesley said. The lawyers described Malik as “just a housewife” and cautioned against rushing to judgment.

For Malik, that would have included Saudi Arabia, where she had lived.

A tiny Islamic prayer rug hung on one wall on the foyer. An upstairs bedroom had a crib, boxes of nappies and a computer.