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 The two suspects were identified as Syed Rizwan Farook, 28, and
Tashfeen Malik, 27, who San Bernardino Police Chief Jarrod Burguan
said were in a relationship, possibly married or engaged. He said
they were believed to be the only shooters involved in an attack
that required some degree of planning.
While the motive remained unclear, Burguan said, "We have not ruled
out terrorism."
Farook was U.S. born, while Malik's nationality was still
undetermined. They were parents of a six-month-old baby girl.
Farook's family and co-workers struggled to make sense of the
shooting, the deadliest in the United States in three years. His
brother-in-law went before television cameras and said he had
"absolutely no idea" why Farook would stage a massacre.
 According to the police chief, Farook was a county public health
employee who attended the party, held in a conference building on
the campus of the Inland Regional Center - a social services agency
- and at some point stormed out. He returned with Malik to open fire
on the celebration. The couple were dressed in assault-style
clothing and also placed several bombs at the scene, which police
detonated.
The shooting rampage marked the deadliest U.S. gun violence since
the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown,
Connecticut, in December 2012, in which 27 people, including the
gunman, were killed.
Wednesday's carnage amplified concerns about gun violence and
security after deadly assaults at a Planned Parenthood clinic in
Colorado Springs last week and the attacks in Paris three weeks ago
by Islamic State militants that killed 130 people.
So far in 2015, the United States has seen more than 350 shootings
in which four or more people were wounded or killed, according to
the crowd-sourced website shootingtracker.com, which keeps a running
tally of U.S. gun violence.
The attack in San Bernardino, a largely working-class city 60 miles
(100 km) east of Los Angeles, appeared to differ from other recent
U.S. killing sprees in several ways, including the involvement of
two people rather than a lone perpetrator.
A third person seen fleeing from the area of the shootout with the
suspects was detained, but Burguan said he was not sure if that
person was involved in the attack.
David Bowdich, an assistant regional FBI director, said earlier in
the day that authorities had not yet determined whether the shooting
was an act of terrorism.
"It is a possibility, but we don't know that," he told reporters.
"It's possible it goes down that road. It's possible it does not."
'WHY WOULD HE DO THAT?'
At a news conference called by the Los Angeles area chapter of the
Muslim advocacy group Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR),
the brother-in-law of Farook, Farhan Khan, said he was bewildered by
the news.
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"Why would he do that? Why would he do something like this? I have
absolutely no idea. I am in shock myself," Khan said at the news
conference in Anaheim, California, south of Los Angeles.
Co-workers told the Los Angeles Times they were surprised to hear
Farook's name linked to the shootings since he was quiet and polite
and did not bear any obvious grudges. They also said he had traveled
to Saudi Arabia and returned with his new wife whom he had met
online.
Hussam Ayloush, executive director of CAIR in the Los Angeles area,
appealed to the public not to jump to conclusions about the
suspects' motives.
"Is it work? Is it rage-related? Is it mental illness? Is it extreme
ideology?" he said. "We just don't know."
The manhunt initially led police to a home in the neighboring town
of Redlands. Police then pursued a suspected getaway vehicle that
was seen leaving that address back to San Bernardino, where the
shootout occurred.
Ayloush told Reuters the couple left their six-month-old-baby with
Farook's mother at that Redlands home early on Wednesday morning and
told her they were going to attend a doctor’s appointment for Malik,
whom he called Farook's wife of two years.
Twelve hours after the attack, the identities of the dead had still
not been made public as investigators delayed examining the crime
scene because of the explosives left there, Burguan said.
Two adult victims of the shooting were in critical but stable
condition at Loma Linda University Medical Center, which said in a
statement that it had received five patients hurt in the attack. The
conditions of patients taken to other medical facilities was not
immediately known.
The shooting and ensuing manhunt practically paralyzed San
Bernardino, a city of 220,000 that was hard hit by the housing
foreclosure crisis and later declared bankruptcy. Dozens of schools,
public offices and hospitals were placed on security alert for
hours.
President Barack Obama lamented an epidemic of gun violence that he
said "has no parallel anywhere else in the world."
And he repeated his call for Congress to pass "common sense gun
safety laws," including tougher background checks for firearm sales.
(Additional reporting by Lisa Richwine and Alex Dobuzinskis in Los
Angeles; Sharon Bernstein in Sacramento; Robin Respaut, Dan Levine,
Yasmeen Abutaleb, Julia Love and Heather Somerville in San
Francisco; Eric M. Johnson in Seattle and Andy Sullivan in
Washington; Writing by Steve Gorman and Mary Milliken; Editing by
Lisa Shumaker, Larry King)
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