Rizwan Farook and Tashfeen Malik

Syed Rizwan Farook and Tashfeen Malik were the two perpetrators of a terrorist attack at the Inland Regional Center in San Bernardino, California, on December 2, 2015. In the attack, they killed 14 civilians and injured 22 others. Both later died in a shootout with police later that same day. Backgrounds Rizwan Farook: Farook was born in Chicago, Illinois, and was a U.S. citizen at the time of the attack. His parents had immigrated from Pakistan. Personal life: According to sources, Farook had a "troubled childhood"[16] and grew up in an "abusive" home in which his father was often violent towards his mother. Farook grew up in Riverside, California, and attended La Sierra High School, graduating in 2004, one year early. He attended California State University, San Bernardino, and received a bachelor's degree in environmental health in either 2009 or 2010. He was a student for one semester in 2014 at California State University, Fullerton in their graduate program for environmental engineering, but never completed the program. Farook had a profile on the dating website iMilap.com, in which he listed backyard target practice as a hobby. A lawyer for Farook's family also said that he would go to firing ranges by himself. Farook worked as a food inspector for the San Bernardino County Department of Public Health for five years before the shooting. From July to December 2010, he was a seasonal employee for the county. He was hired as an environmental health specialist trainee on January 28, 2012, and became a permanent employee on February 8, 2014. Coworkers described Farook as quiet and polite, and said that he held no obvious grudges. Two weeks before the attack, he reportedly tried to explain, during an office conversation, that Islam was a peaceful religion. Religious views and travels: According to family members and coworkers, Farook was a devout Sunni Muslim, and traveled to Saudi Arabia several times, including to complete the Hajj in 2013. Farook attended prayers at the Islamic Center of Riverside twice a day, in the mornings and the evenings, according to an interview in The New York Times with Mustafa H. Kuko, the Center's director. According to the Times, Farook stood out as especially devout and "kept a bit of a distance" from other congregants. During that time, according to friends, he never discussed politics. Farook abruptly stopped going to the mosque in 2014 following his marriage. The Italian newspaper La Stampa reported that Farook's father said that his son "shared the ideology of Al Baghdadi to create an Islamic state" and that he was fixated with Israel. A spokesperson for the Council on American–Islamic Relations (CAIR) and other sources said the father did not recall making these statements about his son. Tashfeen Malik: Malik was born in Pakistan but lived most of her life in Saudi Arabia. Her original hometown was Karor Lal Esan, 280 miles (450 km) southwest of Islamabad, Pakistan. Her landowning family was described as politically influential in the town. Studies in Multan: Malik returned to Pakistan to study pharmacology at Bahauddin Zakariya University in Multan, beginning the program in 2007 and graduating in 2012. Saudi Interior Ministry spokesman Major General Mansour Al-Turki denied reports that Malik grew up in his country, saying that she only visited Saudi Arabia for a few weeks in 2008 and again in 2013. The city of Multan has been linked to jihadist activity. While in Multan, Malik attended the local center of the Al-Huda International Seminary, a women-only religious academy network with seminaries across Pakistan and branches in the U.S. and Canada that was founded in 1994. The school is aligned with the Wahhabi form of Sunni Islam. According to school records, Malik enrolled in an eighteen-month Quranic studies course with Al-Huda on April 17, 2013, and left on May 3, 2014, telling administrators that she was leaving to get married. Malik expressed an interest in completing the course by correspondence, but never did so. According to experts, Al-Huda "draws much of its support from women from educated, relatively affluent backgrounds." Faiza Mushtaq, a Pakistani scholar that studied the organization, said that "these Al-Huda classes is teaching these urban, educated, upper-middle-class women a very conservative interpretation of Islam that makes them very judgmental about others around them." According to the Los Angeles Times, Al-Huda seminaries promote anti-Western views and hard-line practices in a fashion that "could encourage some adherents to lash out against non-believers." The New York Times reported that the institute "teaches a strict literalist interpretation of the Quran, although it does not advocate violent jihad." An Al-Huda administrator from the head office in Islamabad said that terrorism "is against the teachings of Islam" and that the school's curriculum did not endorse violence. Marriage and entry into United States: According to one of Farook's coworkers, Malik and her husband married about a month after he traveled to Saudi Arabia in early 2014; the two had met over the Internet. Malik joined Farook in California shortly after their wedding. A U.S. marriage certificate reported their marriage in Riverside on August 16, 2014. At the time of her death, Malik and Farook had a six-month-old daughter. Malik entered the United States on a K-1 (fiancée) visa with a Pakistani passport. According to a State Department spokesman, all applicants for such visas are fully screened. Malik's application for permanent residency (a "green card") was completed by Farook on her behalf in September 2014, and she was granted a conditional green card in July 2015. Obtaining such a green card would have required the couple to prove that the marriage was legitimate. As is standard practice, as part of her visa application with the State Department and application for a green card, Malik submitted her fingerprints and underwent "three extensive national security and criminal background screenings" using Homeland Security and State Department databases. Malik also underwent two in-person interviews, the first with a consular officer in Pakistan and the second with an immigration officer in the U.S. after applying for a green card. No irregularities or signs of suspicion were found in the record of Malik's interview with the Pakistani consular officer. Malik reportedly had become very religious in the years before the attack, wearing both the niqab and burqa while urging others to do so as well. Pakistani media reported that Malik had ties to the radical Red Mosque in Islamabad, but a cleric and a spokesman from the mosque vehemently denied these claims, saying that they had never heard of Malik before the shooting. Malik's estranged relatives say that she had left the moderate Islam of her family and had become radicalized while living in Saudi Arabia. Saudi Interior Ministry spokesman Al-Turki rejected this claim, stating that Saudi officials received no indication that Malik was radicalized while living there. Internet activities: On December 16, 2015, FBI Director James Comey said, "We can see from our investigation that in late 2013, before there is a physical meeting of these two people Farook and Malik resulting in their engagement and then journey to the United States, they are communicating online, showing signs in that communication of their joint commitment to jihadism and to martyrdom. Those communications are direct, private messages." Early reports had erroneously stated that Malik had openly expressed jihadist beliefs on social media, leading to calls for U.S. immigration officials to routinely review social media as part of background checks, which is not part of the current procedure. Comey subsequently clarified that the remarks were "direct private messages" that were not publicly accessible and that "So far, in this investigation, we have found no evidence of posting on social media." Comey said that the FBI's investigation had revealed that Farook and Malik were "consuming poison on the Internet" and both had become radicalized "before they started courting or dating each other online" and "before the emergence of ISIL." As a result, Comey said that "untangling the motivations of which particular terrorist propaganda motivated in what way remains a challenge in these investigations, and our work is ongoing there." Planning of the attack: In Senate Judiciary Committee testimony given on December 9, 2015, FBI Director James B. Comey said that the FBI investigation has shown that Farook and Malik were "homegrown violent extremists" who were "inspired by foreign terrorist organizations." Comey also said that Farook and Malik "were talking to each other about jihad and martyrdom," before their engagement and as early as the end of 2013. They reportedly spent at least a year preparing for the attack, including taking target practice and making plans to take care of their child and Farook's mother. Comey has said that although the investigation has shown that Farook and Malik were radicalized and possibly inspired by foreign terrorist organizations, there is no indication that the couple were directed by such a group or part of a broader cell or network. The FBI has said that there were "telephonic connections" between the couple and other people of interest in FBI probes. Comey said that the case did not follow the typical pattern for mass shootings or terrorist attacks. A senior U.S. law enforcement official said that Farook contacted "persons of interest" who were possibly tied to terrorism, although these contacts were not "substantial." A senior federal official said that Farook had some contact with people from the Nusra Front, the official al-Qaeda affiliate in Syria, and Shabaab of Somalia, but specifics were unclear.