FBI: Minnesota mall attacker recently 'became interested in Islam'

It was pretty clear from the start that Dahir Ahmed Adan, the man who stabbed 10 people in a Minnesota mall last month, was motivated by his faith. The initial reports suggested Adan had been making references to Allah during the attack. Despite that, the St. Cloud police chief would only say he was “trying to get to the bottom of his motivations.”

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Today the FBI gave an update on the case which makes clear this was indeed another case of Islamic terrorism. FBI Agent Rick Thornoton said, “Within the last several months, Dahir Adan became interested in Islam and began reading the Koran.” Here’s more from Fox News:

Authorities believe Adan had been radicalized recently. They said he had flunked out of school and lost interest in his typical hobbies before turning more deeply to Islam. The FBI was trying to unlock Adan’s phone and was still working to figure out if he self-radicalized or was radicalized by others…

“We have numerous credible witness accounts of him asking victims during the attack if they were Muslim and at least one instance yelling ‘Allahu akbar’ while stabbing one of his victims and others heard him yelling ‘Islam Islam’ during the attack,” Thornton said.

The FBI presentation included surveillance video from the mall showing some of the attack:

Minneapolis Star Tribune reporter Jennifer Brooks live tweeted the FBI presentation on the case:

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This attack might have gone on, there were many more potential victims in the mall. Fortunately, one of the people Adan approached was off-duty police officer Jason Falconer:

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It’s not clear why it took nearly three weeks to state what must have been obvious after a day of investigating this attack. As with the long-delayed release of information on Omar Mateen’s attack on a Florida nightclub, you begin to suspect these releases are being stage managed to downplay the attacker’s motivation.

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