FBI: San Bernardino Shooters Were Radicalized At Least 2 Years Ago

05:02

December 09, 2015

The Associated Press

This July 27, 2014 photo provided by U.S. Customs and Border Protection shows Tashfeen Malik, left, and Syed Farook, as they passed through O'Hare International Airport in Chicago. The husband and wife died on Dec. 2, 2015, in a gun battle with authorities several hours after their assault on a gathering of Farook's colleagues in San Bernardino, Calif. (U.S. Customs and Border Protection via AP)

The two San Bernardino shooters were radicalized at least two years ago - a year before one of them came to the U.S. on a fiancée visa - and discussed jihad and martyrdom as early as 2013, FBI Director James Comey said Wednesday.

Comey told the Senate Judiciary Committee investigators believe that Syed Rizwan Farook and his wife, Tashfeen Malik, were radicalized even before they began their online relationship and that Malik held extremist views before she arrived in the U.S. last year.

The comments suggest that the government's vetting process apparently failed to detect Malik's radicalization when she applied for the visa. Comey said he didn't know enough to say whether weaknesses in the visa process enabled her to enter the U.S.

Reached in Jiddah, Saudi Arabia, Malik's father condemned his daughter's actions and said he is "very, very sad... I am in such pain that I cannot even describe it."

Gulzar Ahmed Malik has been a resident in the kingdom since the early 1980s, the Saudi Interior Ministry says. His daughter was from Pakistan but traveled to Saudi Arabia. A former classmate, Afsheen Butt, said Malik showed drastic changes after a trip to Saudi Arabia in late 2008 or early 2009.

Guest

Phil Ewing, national security editor for NPR. He tweets @philewing.

This segment aired on December 9, 2015.