Director of the FBI, James Comey Thomson Reuters
The director of the FBI, James Comey, said Monday that the man who carried out the worst shooting in US history at a gay nightclub in Orlando mentioned links to Al Qaeda, Hezbollah, and the Islamic State - all within a three-year span.
"We first became aware of him in 2013, while he was working as a security guard at a local courthouse," Comey told reporters Monday. "He made inflammatory and contradictory statements about terrorism that raised concern with his coworkers, and claimed family connections to Al Qaeda."
He continued: "He then said he was a member of Hezbollah, which is a Shiite terrorist organization that is ideologically opposed to Al Qaeda, a Sunni terrorist organization."
Law-enforcement officials have identified the shooter as 29-year-old Omar Mateen. Comey said he was declining to use his name. Comey said the FBI's Miami office opened up a preliminary investigation into the shooter in 2013 that lasted 10 months.