A neighbour, who is awaiting trial on charges that he provided powerful rifles to a Pakistani couple who carried out the San Bernardino massacre last year, had ties to a bunch of jihadists arrested in 2012, US prosecutors said in new court documents.
Eerique Marquez Jr., who is awaiting trial on charges that he helped the shooters, Syed Rizwan Farook and his wife Tashfeen Malik, was tied to jihadists planning to move from California to Afghanistan to fight with Al Qaeda, the prosecutors said in new court documents yesterday.
Marquez, 24, is accused of providing the .223-caliber DPMS model AR-15 and the Smith & Wesson M&P15 assault-style rifles weapons used in the December 2 attack that killed 14 people, the deadliest terrorist attack on US soil since 9/11.
Until this week, officials had not suggested that Marquez had known ties to other extremists, the Los Angles Times reported.
In the court documents, prosecutors say Marquez had connections to "California jihadists" who were arrested in 2012 when they tried to go to Afghanistan to fight with Al Qaeda.
The documents did not provide details about what ties Marquez had or name the "California jihadists." That year however, four men, Ralph Deleon, Sohiel Omar Kabir, Miguel Santana and Arafin Gojali, were arrested on suspicion of plotting to travel overseas to Afghanistan, join Al Qaeda and kill Americans, the report said.
Prosecutors have alleged that Marquez planned earlier attacks prior to December 2 with one of the San Bernardino shooters, Syed Rizwan Farook, a Pakistani-American. Those efforts were abandoned.
Farook and his wife, Tashfeen Malik, a Pakistani national, carried out the December 2 San Bernardino attack. Prosecutors have said Marquez did not play a role in carrying out that attack but alleged he did provide the shooters with guns.
But in a court filing connected to Farook's case, prosecutors wrote that Marquez had "ties to a group of jihadists."
Authorities provided no other details of the ties and would not comment, and Marquez's attorney declined to comment on Wednesday, the report said.
However, the FBI contradicted prosecutors' description of Marquez's ties to the jihadists in a statement on Wednesday.
"The FBI thoroughly investigated the alleged connections between Enrique Marquez and the four individuals arrested for the 2012 terror plot and concluded there were no direct ties to any of the four," the statement said.
The detail about Marquez was included in a court filing seeking to stop two life insurance payments worth USD 275,000 from being paid out to Farook's family.
After the attacks, Marquez was indicted on charges of conspiring to provide material support to terrorists, lying about rifle purchases, marriage fraud and lying on a visa application. He has pleaded not guilty and is expected to go to trial next year.
