San Bernardino shooting: US Media broadcasts live footage from inside home of suspects

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Andrew Feinberg

White House Correspondent

The landlord of the two people suspected of carrying out the killing spree that left 14 people dead, has invited the media into their home - leaving the channels fighting off allegations of impropriety but also providing a glimpse into the lives of the alleged killers.

At least two channels, including CNN and NBC, boasted of their scoop of being invited inside the property in Redlands, California, where they showed viewers family photo albums and their living areas.

It was the property where Syed Rizwan and his wife, Tashfeen Malik, lived with his mother.

Police had said when they searched the property on Wednesday evening, they discovered more than 4,000 rounds of ammunition and 12 pipe bombs. They said they also found tools for making such devices.

It was also believed to be where the couple had left their six-month-old daughter on Wednesday morning, before setting off for the Inland Regional Center, where they killed 14 people and injured more than 20.

The decision to allow the media enter the property, located about five miles from the city of San Bernardino, sparked many to ask questions online about the behaviour of the media and asking if it had crossed an ethical line.

A number questioned whether the presence of the media cameras could potentially contaminate evidence related to the attack.

Earlier on Friday, it was reported that Ms Malik had pledged allegiance to Isis leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.

A number of US media outlets said that according to US officials, Ms Malik, the wife of Mr Rizwan, pledged allegiance to al-Baghdadi in a posting on Facebook under an account that used a different name. The posting, since deleted, was made shortly before the attack, according to one report.

Officials said there was no evidence yet that Isis had directed Ms Malik, and her husband to launch the attacks, which killed 14 and wounded 21.

“At this point we believe they were more self-radicalised and inspired by the group than actually told to do the shooting,” one official told the New York Times.

President Barack Obama and the FBI have stressed investigators are still probing the circumstances of the attack and the motivation behind it. Mr Obama said it was too early to say whether the attack was terrorism, a work-related killing, or a combination of the two.

Yet attention has increasingly focussed on the apparent increased radicalisation the couple underwent in the months before the assault on a facility that coordinates services for people with development difficulties.

The fact that Ms Malik apparently made a posting on Facebook will add to suspicions and claims that a “deeper terror matrix” may lie behind the shooting attack.

In the days leading up to the shooting, the couple took several steps to delete their electronic information, in an apparent effort to cover their tracks, officials said. Those efforts have led authorities to believe that the shooting was premeditated, it has been reported.

Mr Rizwan, was born in Illinois and raised in Southern California, and worked worked for the San Bernardino County health department.

He met his wife online and brought her to the US from Saudi Arabia in the summer of 2014 on a K-1 visa, which designated her his fiancée, and required a rigorous background check.

He applied for a permanent resident green card for her in September 2014, and she was granted a conditional card last July.

Ms Malik’s family is originally from Pakistan and the intelligence services in Islamabad have reportedly been in touch with in touch with her family.