The FBI has identified 42-year-old Shamsud-Din Jabbar as the man accused of killing at least 14 people in New Orleans early on New Year’s Day by ramming a truck into a crowd, in an incident that is now being probed as an act of terrorism—with investigators adding Thursday they believe he acted alone.
This undated passport photo provided by the FBI shows Shamsud-Din Jabbar.
Jabbar—who died at the scene of the attack—is a U.S.-born citizen from Texas who served in the Army, FBI Assistant Special Agent-in-Charge Alethea Duncan said at a Wednesday afternoon press conference.
The FBI confirmed an ISIS flag was found on the vehicle’s trailer hitch, and the agency said Wednesday it was trying to determine Jabbar’s “potential associations and affiliations with terrorist organizations.”
FBI Deputy Assistant Director Christopher Raia says Jabbar posted videos to Facebook hours ahead of the attack claiming he had joined ISIS before the summer, and suggesting he initially intended to kill his family but wanted news coverage to emphasize a “war” between believers and nonbelievers.
Raia also said the FBI thinks Jabbar acted alone, a change of course after the FBI said Wednesday it does not believe Jabbar “was solely responsible.”
Jabbar reportedly said in a 2020 YouTube video he was born in Beaumont, Texas—a city of just over 100,000 located about 80 miles east of Houston—and worked in real estate in the Houston area.
Jabbar has been married and divorced twice and has at least two children, according to multiple reports: A man who is now married to Jabbar’s first wife—whom he divorced in 2012—told The New York Times that Jabbar recently converted to Islam and began “being all crazy,” causing his ex-wife to stop his 15- and 20-year-old daughters from seeing him.
Jabbar’s second wife filed for divorce in 2020 and was granted a restraining order against him, NBC News reported—the case was dismissed, but the couple later got divorced in 2022.
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Jabbar was on active duty in the Army from 2007 to 2015, working as an information technology and human resources specialist and deploying to Afghanistan for about a year in 2009, an unnamed Army spokesperson told CNN. He later served in the Army Reserve until 2020, leaving as a staff sergeant, CNN reported. Duncan says he was honorably discharged. At the time of his 2012 divorce, he said in legal filings he resided at Fort Bragg in North Carolina, according to the Times. In 2004, he reportedly enlisted in the Navy but was discharged a month later.
Jabbar described himself as a real estate professional in a 2020 video seen by CNN and the Times. Texas Real Estate Commission records show Jabbar’s sales agent license expired last year. In a court document filed as part of his second divorce in 2022, Jabbar disclosed he worked for accounting firm Deloitte at the time and earned around $120,000 a year, according to the Times.
Jabbar attended Central High School in Beaumont, Texas, graduating in 2001, his childhood friend Chris Pousson told the Times. In 2017, after leaving active-duty military service, he graduated from Georgia State University with a bachelor’s of business administration, the school told CNN. Jabbar told the school’s campus paper in 2015 he was struggling to readjust to civilian life: He said it was often challenging to navigate the federal bureaucracy to get his G.I. Bill tuition benefits, and told a student reporter—now a Times freelancer—“you don’t know how to speak” without using military acronyms.
In court filings, Jabbar suggested he faced some financial trouble. Records from his 2022 divorce reportedly mentioned late home payments, a “danger of foreclosure” and credit card debt, and said a business he started lost $28,000. More than a decade ago, his first wife sued him over child support, but the case was dismissed in 2022, according to CNN. The Times also reported that Jabbar was charged with two minor crimes in 2002 and 2005, first for misdemeanor theft in Katy, Texas—near Houston—and later for driving with an invalid license.
The suspect’s brother Abdur Jabbar told the Times he’s “shocked by all of this” and “would have never imagined him doing something like this,” describing his brother as a “sweetheart” and “really smart, caring.” He said the two brothers were raised as Christians, and his sibling later converted to Islam, though he added: “what he did does not represent Islam. This is more some type of radicalization, not religion.” Meanwhile, Jabbar’s childhood friend Pousson told the Times he “made good grades” and “wasn’t a troublemaker at all,” and noticed on Facebook Jabbar had “gotten really passionate about his faith” in recent years but “was never threatening any violence.” Pousson also told NBC News Jabbar—whom he called “Sham”—was “very quiet, very reserved,” and his social media posts about religion were “always positive — peace be with you, uplifting type of stuff.”
According to New Orleans police, the attacker rammed a rented Ford truck into a crowd of pedestrians on Bourbon Street at around 3:15 a.m. early Wednesday. At least 14 people were killed in the attack and dozens were injured, Raia says. Several police officers responded to the scene of the crash, after which the suspect emerged from the vehicle and fired at them. His bullets struck two officers—who are in stable condition—before officers returned fire. He was killed at the scene. Weapons and a “potential” improvised explosive device were found in the attacker’s truck, and other possible explosive devices were recovered in New Orleans’ French Quarter area, according to the FBI.
The site of the attack, Bourbon Street—located in the city’s French Quarter—is a popular tourist spot where a large number of people had gathered for New Year’s celebrations. The city has also drawn tourists for the annual college football Sugar Bowl, which organizers postponed from Wednesday until Thursday due to the attack. The FBI is the lead investigative agency probing the incident, and said it is working with federal and local partners to “investigate this as an act of terrorism.”