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Orlando shooter pledged loyalty to conflicting organizations

Associated Press
Published | Updated
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    FILE - In this May 19, 2016 file photo, FBI Director James Comey, calls on a reporter during a news conference in Chicago. The Orlando gunman professed allegiance during the attack to the leader of the Islamic State even as he called the Boston Marathon bombers, who had nothing to do with the extremist group, his “homeboys.” Before that, the FBI said, he claimed family connections to al-Qaida and boasted of ties to Hezbollah, organizations deeply at odds with the Islamic State. Comey says those statements add to the confusion about why Omar Mateen gunned down people inside a gay nightclub. But such conflicting, jumbled loyalties aren’t uncommon among terror suspects in the United States. (AP Photo/Charles Rex Arbogast, File) (The Associated Press)

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    FILE - In this May 19, 2016 file photo, FBI Director James Comey, calls on a reporter during a news conference in Chicago. The Orlando gunman professed allegiance during the attack to the leader of the Islamic State even as he called the Boston Marathon bombers, who had nothing to do with the extremist group, his “homeboys.” Before that, the FBI said, he claimed family connections to al-Qaida and boasted of ties to Hezbollah, organizations deeply at odds with the Islamic State. Comey says those statements add to the confusion about why Omar Mateen gunned down people inside a gay nightclub. But such conflicting, jumbled loyalties aren’t uncommon among terror suspects in the United States. (AP Photo/Charles Rex Arbogast, File) (The Associated Press)

WASHINGTON – The Orlando gunman who professed allegiance during the attack on a gay nightclub to the leader of the Islamic State militants also claimed ties to groups that have nothing to do with that organization, or are even at odds with it.

FBI Direction James Comey says those statements add to the confusion about why Omar Mateen gunned down 49 people Sunday night.

But such conflicting, jumbled loyalties aren't uncommon among terror suspects in the United States.

In the last year, several men who committed violence or attempted to under the purported mantle of the Islamic State militants were also found to have derived inspiration from other sources and had often been absorbing extremist ideologies well before IS emerged as a brand-name terror organization with its self-declared caliphate in 2014.
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