Terror in New Orleans
Security personnel gather at the scene on Bourbon Street after a vehicle turned onto Bourbon from Canal Street and drove into a crowd early Wednesday morning in the French Quarter. AP photo by Gerald Herbert
The FBI is continuing to investigate more than 400 tips from the public regarding the New Year’s Day ISIS-inspired terror attack on New Orleans’ Bourbon Street even as city and state officials say the Crescent City is safe and open for business.
“To protect our citizens from evil you have to crush it. And that’s what we’re going to do here,” Gov. Jeff Landry said during a Thursday morning press conference.
Within hours of the attack, Landry declared a state of emergency in Orleans Parish ahead of Thursday’s rescheduled Sugar Bowl, the start of Mardi Gras on Monday, and the Super Bowl in February. The declaration allows the state to use all its resources to enhance safety.
Bourbon Street reopened to the public Thursday afternoon. The iconic street had been closed since Shamsud-Din Jabbar, a 42-year-old Americanborn citizen from Texas, intentionally drove his rented pickup truck through revelers gathered for New Year’s Eve and for the Sugar Bowl College Football Playoff quarterfinal game between Notre Dame and Georgia.
At least 14 people died, and 35 more were injured. Jabbar died at the scene in a shootout with police.
Authorities now say Jabbar, a U. S. Army veteran, acted alone.
“We do not assess at this point that anyone else is involved in this attack other than Shamsud-Din Jabbar,” Christopher Raia, deputy assistant director of the FBI’s counterintelligence division, said during Thursday’s livestreamed briefing.
“This was an act of terrorism. It was premeditated and an evil act,” Raia said.
Officials said what they learned from other surveillance video led them to backtrack on statements made Wednesday that Jabbar apparently had accomplices.
Federal investigators now believe the three men and one woman seen in the French Quarter in surveillance video appearing to place improvised explosive devices in other New Orleans locations were only looking at the ice chests that supposedly contained the IEDs.
Raia said other video shows Jabbar placing the bombs several hours before he drove his Ford truck around police cars and into the crowd.
“We want to be transparent with the public,” Raia said in answer to a reporter’s question about the change in the position. “We are confident at this point that there’s no accomplice.”
Landry likened the investigation into the mass killing to a jigsaw puzzle the shape of which changes as pieces are discovered.
“Nobody dumps a 1,000-piece jigsaw puzzle and puts it together in 15 seconds,” he said.
Raia said investigators don’t know why Jabbar targeted Bourbon Street. He said Jabbar declared his support for ISIS on five videos evidently posted while he was driving from Texas to Louisiana on New Year’s Eve.
Authorities have recovered three cell phones and two laptops linked to Jabbar.
As of Thursday, investigators were still looking into a fire at an Airbnb home they believe is connected to the Bourbon Street attack. Also as of Thursday, the FBI said there appears to be no link between a terror attack in Las Vegas and the New Orleans incident.
A Tesla Cybertruck exploded outside the Trump International Hotel in Las Vegas early Wednesday, killing one person, just hours after Jabbar rammed down Bourbon Street.
“At this point there is no definitive link between the attack here in New Orleans and the one in Las Vegas,” Raia said.
