correspondent James Matthews has more in just a warning His report contains a graphic description of the attack in the early hours of New Year’s Day in New Orleans. This was Bourbon Street, not long after 3:00 a.m. Two people are seen lying in the street as armed officers race to the scene. In the heart of the city’s French Quarter, a man had driven a pickup truck into crowds who’d come to clock in the new year, and it was very intentional behaviour. Uh, this man was trying to run over as many people as.
He possibly could be this perpetrator who went around our barricades in order to conduct this. He was hellbent on creating the carnage and the damage that he did. The attacker has been named as 42-year-old Shamsu Djabar, a US citizen from Texas. He was driving a rented Ford pickup. Having driven it through the crowd, he got out and started shooting at police officers. Two were injured. Jabar died in the ensuing firefight. This was Shamu Jabar four years ago on a YouTube video introducing himself as a property manager. I just.
I want to say hello and let you know a little bit about me. I was born and raised in Bowmont, Texas, and now live in Houston, and I’ve been here all my life, with the exception of travelling for the military, where FBI investigators say he was ex-military and believe he was honourably discharged. In committing mass murder, they believe he wasn’t acting alone. We do not believe that Javar was solely responsible. We are aggressively running down every lead, including those of his known associates, from whom weapons were recovered.
New Orleans attack: Terror suspect ‘not solely responsible’ as ISIS flag is found in vehicle
the vehicle, as well as an improvised explosive device. Other devices were found in the vicinity. An ISIS flag was also recovered from the pickup. Investigators are calling this a suspected terror attack and are looking into potential links with terror groups. This has all the hallmarks of being a terrorist attack, including the size of the event that was targeted, the fact that it was a recognised New Year holiday here in the United States, and also the fact that a vehicle was used, as we know Al-Qaeda and ISIS have been.
calling over the past several decades for the use of vehicles to be used to carry out terrorist attacks, the world comes to New Orleans to party all year round. It did last night; tens of thousands were gathered downtown. Of the victims, police said most were local to the area. Revellers spoke of the panic that spread through the crowd. One man spoke to our partners at NBC amid questions over security:We have tank barricades, like the metal hydraulic raising unram barricades, because this has happened so many times when we got.
There me and my friend were surprised that they hadn’t put these up. They never put the barricades up. This man was able to hit 70 miles an hour for a clean 8 to 10 blocks down Bourbon. For now, the key security questions Centre on barriers placed between the attacker and his victims. President Biden issued a statement saying his heart went out to the victims as he flew to Camp David. He said more later: I’ve spoken to every member of the agency, from the CIA to our national security team to our FBI NC, and we’re gathering all.
The and I spent a lot of time with the government with the May. What was your reaction when you heard what happened? Well, the reaction was one of anger and frustration. The iconic streets that welcomed large crowds are now empty, thousands having come to see in 2025 with a fresh eye and witnessed carnage. James Matthews, Sky News, in Washington.