FBI says Bourbon Street terrorist acted alone, as tourists return after mass killing

New Orleans, LA, Jan. 2, 2025 —The FBI said Thursday that agents now believe a U.S. Army veteran from Houston acted alone when he drove to New Orleans late Tuesday, planted pipe bombs in a pair of ice chests along Bourbon Street, then sped a rented pickup truck into the reveling crowds, killing 15 people in a bloody scene in the wee hours of the New Year.

Shamsud-Din Jabbar, who was shot and killed by New Orleans police officers after opening fire, had posted videos to social media on his way to New Orleans, "proclaiming his support for ISIS," said Christopher Raia, deputy assistant director of the FBI's counter-terrorism division.

Raia said that Jabbar was "100 percent inspired by ISIS" and claimed he'd joined the group. Jabbar said he'd planned to harm loved ones but was concerned the headlines would ignore "the war between believers and disbelievers," Raia said.

The view that Jabbar acted alone marked a shift, as an FBI agent had previously said that investigators were on the hunt for others. Raia also said the FBI has discounted a link between the attack in New Orleans and the explosion of a Tesla Cybertruck in Las Vegas on Wednesday

His statement came shortly after federal authorities returned control of Bourbon Street, until then a crime scene, to New Orleans.

The city's most famous entertainment zone began to lurch back to life within hours, in advance of the Allstate Sugar Bowl, which kicked off at 3 p.m. inside Caesars Superdome after officials postponed it from Wednesday night.

As Gov. Jeff Landry appeared on the field with Mayor LaToya Cantrell, many of the 100 Louisiana National Guard military police officers that Landry ordered to the city on Wednesday were patrolling the French Quarter, alongside New Orleans police officers, state troopers and federal Homeland Security agents, including those clad in camo and protective vests and carrying automatic weapons.

Flowers, too, appeared: 14 yellow roses rested against a gray wall at Canal and Bourbon streets, one for every fatal victim of the violent attack. At least 35 others were wounded. Cantrell and local religious leaders laid them there, and a brass band played "I'll Fly Away."

A scene and sound familiar to many New Orleans visitors — bass drums, horns, vendors selling beads, Lucky Dog — began to trickle back online.

Several French Quarter restaurants that closed Wednesday had opened their doors by Thursday afternoon.

"You are going to see incredibly large presence of police," said New Orleans Police Department Superintendent Anne Kirkpatrick.

New Security Measures

Newly erected barricades on streets and sidewalks were fresh on the scene, filling in gaps for the bollards that the city was in the midst of replacing when the attacker struck.

Thursday also brought word on more of the victims, nine of whom have been identified, and new details on the murderous actions and possible motives of Jabbar, a 42-year-old divorcee who had rented a pickup on Dec. 30 in Texas for the trip.

Even as Raia spoke Thursday morning, ATF and FBI agents began to scour a short-term rental on Mandeville Street in the St. Roch neighborhood where officials said Jabbar stayed before the attack.

The home was reported on fire two hours after the mass killing on Bourbon Street, in what authorities are investigating as an arson. Responding firefighters came across a gas can and explosives and alerted the NOPD, officials said.

"We do not believe the public is in any danger around any of these locations," Raia said.

Joshua Jackson, ATF special agent in charge, said Thursday that agents were seeking answers to how the fire started after police shot and killed Jabbar.

"The working theory now is that the fire started after Jabbar was already deceased," Jackson said. "There are a lot of ways that could happen. You could have a timed device. ... You could also have pressure cookers, put on top of a stove, filled with gasoline. There are a lot of ways to do it."

Authorities say Jabbar strapped an ISIS flag to the back of the Ford-150 before he barreled into pedestrians until the pickup struck machinery in the 300 block of Bourbon.

Before then, Jabbar was caught on camera in a long coat, placing an ice chest at Bourbon Street and Orleans Avenue and another two blocks away. According to a source, each contained explosives and roofing nails and was set to activate by remote detonators with a short transmission range.

It's unclear if Jabbar aimed to set off the bombs as he mowed down Bourbon Street partiers. The bombs never went off. The FBI said it later rendered them safe.

A source said street cameras captured some people opening the coolers. One woman was filmed on the ground beside one of them, twerking.

The source said revelers' actions made it more difficult to determine whether Jabbar had acted in concert with others.

But after reviewing evidence that includes a pair of recovered laptops and three cell phones from Jabbar, Raia said, "we do not assess at this point that anyone else ... is involved in this attack except for Shamsud-Din Jabbar. "

'Satan's Voice'

According to Landry and others, the attack brought hundreds of new state police and federal specialists to the city in advance of the Super Bowl. Landry said more than 1,000 officers and agents were now deployed to protect the city.

Whether the FBI's revised theory of a lone domestic terrorist will alter that strategy is uncertain. Landry, who signed an emergency declaration on Wednesday that freed up some of those resources, suggested it wouldn't.

"It was based on the idea we didn't know what we had," Landry said inside the Superdome shortly before Thursday's bowl game. But Jabbar's violent actions, he said, had turned up the spotlight on the city, and thus the security concerns.

Federal authorities have scoured Jabbar's social media in the meantime, turning up recordings on a SoundCloud account, one of which likened music to "Satan's Voice."

"Forbidding the evil is a mandate on all of mankind," Jabbar said in a recording posted to the account 11 months ago.

Friends and relatives of Jabbar said he practiced Islam, though they also said he attended a Christian church in his younger years.

Some who knew Jabbar have cautioned that his beliefs were an about-face from his younger years. Aron "Passa" Palmer, 42, said in an interview Wednesday that he grew up a block away from Jabbar and remembered his friend as a quiet and intellectual kid, more open-minded than some peers when it came to music. He said Jabbar's taste extended to Wu-Tang Clan, Outkast and Nas.

"This is not the person that we knew growing up," Palmer said. "He was a really good guy. We don't know this guy."

Meanwhile, the attorney representing two officers who were injured in the shootout that left Jabbar dead called their actions heroic Thursday.

"These officers were able to do what their training and their courage allowed them to do, and they came up on top, thank God," said Eric Hessler, an attorney for the Police Association of New Orleans.

Hessler said the officers were in "extreme" close quarters with Jabbar, who was "prepared to go to battle," donning a ballistics vest and headgear.

"Obviously, the event itself was a terrible tragedy, and it could have been much worse but for the intervention of these officers who were able to stop him before he was able to injure and kill more people," Hessler added.

The FBI urged anyone in the French Quarter on New Year's Eve or New Year's Day to talk with law enforcement. The FBI also set up a digital tip line. Anyone with information, photos or video footage of the incident, Jabbar or the two coolers containing IEDs can submit tips to www.fbi.gov/bourbonstreetattack.

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