Police said a search was launched after a teen’s mother reported her son was suicidal and ran away, and her weapons and vehicle were missing.
SAN DIEGO — Hours before game San Diego mosque attack The crash left three men dead, including a security guard who was hailed as a hero, and police are racing to find the two teenagers ultimately thought to be responsible.
Police Chief Scott Wahl said the search began after a teen’s mother reported her son was suicidal and ran away. Weapons and vehicles were missing from the home, he said.
Two hours after her call, The shooting started exist San Diego Islamic Centerwhich also houses a school.
The two suspects, aged 17 and 18, were found in a nearby car after committing suicide.
Wahl said police were investigating Monday’s shooting as a hate crime. This is the latest a series of attacks Threats and hate crimes against Muslim and Jewish communities have increased since the war in the Middle East began, Forced security improvements.
During a news conference Tuesday afternoon, Chief Scott Wahl praised the three victims as heroes. Speaking of security guard Amin Abdullah, one of the victims, Wahl said, “There is no doubt that his actions delayed, distracted and ultimately prevented the two men from entering the mosque.” He went on to say that when the security guard allowed the suspect to engage with him rather than enter the building, nearly 150 children were about 20 feet away.
Chief War said Mansoor Qaziha and Nader Awad were the other two victims. The two had the suspect follow them into a parking lot away from the building, where they were eventually cornered and killed.
Police had not released the identities of the teens Tuesday morning, but investigators were searching the San Diego home of high school student Cain Clark following the shooting. Clark’s parents, who are listed in public records as living at the home, did not return messages seeking comment, nor did other family members.
San Diego Unified School District spokesman James Canning said school police are working with San Diego authorities to investigate the mosque attack. Clark said he has been attending school online since 2021 and expects to graduate next month.
While he didn’t attend school in person, he did compete on the wrestling team at Madison High School in San Diego in 2024 as a member of the wrestling team. Canning said Clark had no record of disciplinary issues in high school.
Neighbors Marn and Ted Zelaya said they last saw Clark hours before the shooting, waving to him as he got into his car and drove away alone. They described the Clarks as good neighbors for more than two decades and remembered when Kane was born and watched him and his brother grow up.
“It’s unbelievable,” Maan Zelaya said of the shooting. “He brought my groceries in for me.”
‘Hate speech’ plays a role
Authorities plan to execute the search warrants on Tuesday and work out how and why they will be executed. attack happened. There were no specific threats against the Islamic Center, Santiago’s largest mosque, but authorities found the suspect had made “general hate speech,” Wahl said.
American Muslim organizations were quick to point out the rise in anti-Muslim rhetoric across the United States, with Mohamed Gula, interim CEO of advocacy group Emgage Action, saying “words have consequences.”
San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria said in an interview with CNN News that the attack was related to white supremacy, so authorities were considering whether it was a hate crime.
Victims include a security guard
Among the victims were a security guard Wahl said police believed he “played a key role” in preventing the attack “from becoming more serious”.
The police chief said the actions of the guards prevented the attack from extending beyond the front area of the mosque.
The mosque has not released the names of the victims. But a family friend identified the guard as Amin Abdullah, who had worked at the mosque for more than a decade.
“He wanted to protect the innocent, so he decided to become a security guard,” said Sheikh Uthman ibn Farooq, who spoke to Abdullah’s son.
In a post on Facebook, the mosque called him “a brave man who put himself at the safety of others and never stopped protecting our community even in his final moments.”
It describes one of the other victims as a foundation for the center, who worked to build community from the beginning. The other man’s “kindness, sincerity and wavering spirit touched everyone around him,” it was said.
Those who died were “men of bravery, sacrifice and faith,” the center wrote. “Their absence leaves a void that can never truly be filled.”
The search began two hours before the attack
Just before the attack, the search for the missing teen intensified Monday morning as law enforcement gathered more details. Police were alerted when they spotted him wearing camouflage clothing and with a friend. Police used an automated license plate reader to track the car to a shopping center and headed there.
The police chief said the suspect’s mother had called police while other officers were talking to her, and the first report of the shooting came from a mosque a few blocks away, near a Middle Eastern restaurant and market. The center includes Al Rashid School, which offers Arabic, Islamic studies and Quran classes for students ages 5 and older, according to its website.
Television footage showed more than a dozen children holding hands walking out of the center’s parking lot, surrounded by police cars.
Wahl said that while police were searching for the gunman at the mosque, there were reports that someone in a getaway vehicle had fired at a landscaper who was not seriously injured. Police later found the suspect dead.
Daniel McDonald said he was inside his house when he heard gunshots. He went outside to find the street blocked off, glass on the sidewalk shattered and gardeners shaken. He said he saw police trying to revive one of the suspects.
Johnson reported from Seattle and Bizek reported from Washington. Jaimie Ding and Christopher Weber in Los Angeles, Hannah Schoenbaum in Salt Lake City, Javier Arciga and Gregory Bull in San Diego, John Seewer in Toledo, Ohio, and Hallie Golden in Seattle contributed to this report.
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