FBI Says New Orleans Attacker Acted Alone, 'No Definitive Link' To Vegas Incident
Law enforcement officials said Thursday that Army veteran Shamsud-Din Jabbar acted alone when he planted two improvised explosive devices and then sped a truck into a crowd on New Orleans’ iconic Bourbon Street in the early hours of New Year’s Day.
Fourteen people have died and at least 35 more were injured in what FBI Deputy Assistant Director Christopher Raia at a news conference called “an act of terrorism.”
Raia said that while an investigation is ongoing, there is “no definitive link” between the New Orleans attack and a spectacular explosion in Las Vegas that occurred later the same day.
In that incident, the driver of a Tesla Cybertruck died after pulling up outside a hotel owned by President-elect Donald Trump near the Las Vegas Strip. Authorities said Thursday they believe the man was Matthew Livelsberger, a 37-year-old active-duty soldier on leave from Germany. Investigators believe he shot himself in the head before the vehicle burned, but so far no clear motive has been found.
The Associated Press reported that both Jabbar and Livelsberger spent time at Fort Bragg, now called Fort Liberty, although they did not overlap. Both vehicles had also been rented using the car rental app Turo.
President Joe Biden reiterated in a news conference that the FBI has found no connection between the two events, but he instructed them to “keep looking.”
Jabbar, 42, had made his intentions clear on social media, according to officials. He wanted to show support for the Islamic State terror group, also known as ISIS, Raia said, noting that Jabbar posted four videos to Facebook shortly before he drove onto Bourbon Street. Jabbar said in one of them that he initially thought about harming his friends and family but worried that if he did so, the media would focus less on what he called the “war between the believers and the disbelievers.”
Jabbar claimed to have joined ISIS last summer, according to Raia. Lawmakers in Congress told The New York Post that Jabbar was not on any terror watch lists.
Bourbon Street was reopened to the public Thursday morning, New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell said. The Sugar Bowl, a college football matchup between Notre Dame and Georgia, is scheduled to kick off at 3 p.m. Central Time on Thursday.
“We do not believe the public is in any danger,” Raia said.
Jabbar is believed to have rented the white Ford truck in Houston on Dec. 30 before driving to New Orleans, speeding through the tourist hot spot around 3 a.m. with an ISIS flag hanging off the truck. He got out of the vehicle, opened fire with police and was shot dead.
Surveillance footage also captured Jabbar placing coolers containing explosive devices at different spots near Bourbon Street, Raia said, contradicting earlier reports indicating that Jabbar had accomplices and there had been a greater number of bombs.
“We’re confident, at this point, that there are no accomplices,” Raia told reporters Thursday.
Jabbar had a remote detonator with him in the truck, Biden said from the White House. It is unclear why the devices did not explode.
Two laptops and three phones linked to Jabbar are being analyzed. He left behind a will.
Authorities are also searching for clues at a house in Mandeville, Louisiana, just north of New Orleans.
Joshua Jackson, special agent with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, confirmed there had been a fire at the Mandeville address, but said that it likely started after Jabbar died. He hypothesized that the fire might have been rigged to start at a certain time.
Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry (R) likened the nascent investigation to starting a jigsaw puzzle.
“From yesterday to today, over 1,000 law enforcement agents and officers, men and women, have been poring over countless amounts of data, videos, surveillances, interviews, tracking down every possible lead that came to us,” Landry said.
