Couple's family baffled over what motivated San Bernardino attack

Couple’s family baffled over what motivated San Bernardino attack

Dec. 4, 2015 7:58 AM PT

The sister of Syed Rizwan Farook told CBS that she was shocked that her brother and his wife, Tashfeen Malik, could be capable of carrying out a mass shooting that would leave so many people dead.

Saira Khan condemned the Wednesday attack at the Inland Regional Center in San Bernardino that killed 14 people and injured 21.

“There is so many things I ask myself,” Khan told the TV news station. “I ask myself if I had called him that morning or the night before and asked him how he was doing and what he was up to. If I had any inclination, maybe I could have stopped it.”

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Khan described the couple as “shy and quiet.”

Farook and Malik were killed Wednesday in a gun battle with police hours after the mass killing at the Inland Regional Center.

Attorney David Chesley, who represents the shooter’s family, told CNN “there is a lot of disconnects and there is a lot of unknowns and there is a lot things that quite frankly don’t add up or seem implausible.”

Chesley said the 90-pound Malik was not involved in the shooting and could not have carried the heavy armory and tactical gear.

“It just doesn’t make sense for these two to act like some kind of Bonnie and Clyde or something,” Chesley said. “It’s just ridiculous.”

Chesley sat with the FBI for three hours to determine characteristics and affiliations that could have motivated Farook, 28, to carry out the shooting, he said.

“They couldn’t find anything,” he said. “They were totally stumped. They were totally frustrated.”

“There was nothing to characterize to make him act in this manner,” Chesley said of Farook.

In an interview with NBC, Farhan Khan described his brother-in-law and sister-in-law as a “happy couple” who led ordinary lives.

Khan told the TV news station Farook was “a good religious person” and “not radical.”

“It’s his stupid action, nothing to do with religion at all,” he said. “It’s always going to be a question ... you know, why he did something like that. A normal person living with my family. Why would he do something like that?

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