In the early hours of January 1, 2025, a tragic incident unfolded on Bourbon Street in New Orleans when a pickup truck plowed into a crowd of New Year’s revelers, resulting in 15 fatalities and injuring at least 35 others.
The driver, identified as 42-year-old Shamsud-Din Jabbar, was fatally shot by police after he exited the vehicle and opened fire.
FBI Deputy Assistant Director Christopher Raia addressed the media.
Full transcript below:
FBI Deputy Assistant Director Christopher Raia
Good morning. I am FBI Deputy Assistant Director Christopher Raia. I’m from our Counterterrorism Division at headquarters. I’m also joined by Assistant Special Agent in Charge Aletheia Duncan from our New Orleans office, who you heard from yesterday.I’m here to discuss not only the latest investigative information we have here in New Orleans, but I’ll also let you know about other investigative activities outside of the state.
First, and most importantly, want to send our deepest condolences to the victims of this horrific attack and their loved ones. Fourteen innocent victims were killed in this senseless attack, and at least 35 were injured.
We cannot ease the grief people in this community and across the nation are feeling at this time. But rest assured, we stand with you and in support of you.
All the resources—I’m going to go into that a little bit—all the resources of the FBI are being focused on tracking down every piece of evidence, every lead, every interview, every potential lead we’ve got. While I won’t be able to answer all your questions today, my goal is to be as forthcoming as possible with you on what we’ve uncovered so far.
First and foremost, let me be very clear about this point: this was an act of terrorism. It was premeditated and an evil act. This was obviously a critical incident, and with that, lots of information and tips come pouring in from law enforcement, first responders, and the public.
We have been aggressively running down these tips and information. As you all know, that takes time, and we will continue to do so until every lead has been followed through on.
This investigation is only a little more than 24 hours old, so I ask you to keep that in mind as I go through some of the specifics later.
But at this point, and this is another fact I want to be clear on, we do not assess that anyone else is involved in this attack except for Shamsud-Din Jabbar, the subject you’ve already been briefed on.
A little bit about what the FBI is doing: we are surging people and assets to the area from across the region and across the nation.
Special agents in multiple field offices across the country have been deployed and are assisting with potential aspects of this investigation and following up on every lead.
Additional teams of special agents, professional staff, and victim specialists continue to arrive to provide more investigative power and assistance to the victims and their families.
We’ve also forward-deployed a number of our Critical Incident Response Group assets, including members of our Hostage Rescue Team, Special Agent Bomb Technicians, and Crisis Management Coordinators. In addition, we have deployed more Evidence Response Technicians to continue to process the various scenes that we have.
So far, we have received just over 400 tips from the public. This information is being followed up on both here in New Orleans and across the country. Some of the tips are here in New Orleans, and there are other tips in other states across the country that we are following up on.
The FBI team and our law enforcement partners here are also reviewing hundreds of hours of surveillance and other video from both the French Quarter and other locations.
As for a timeline, at this point, investigators believe Jabbar picked up the rented F-150 in Houston, Texas, on December 30.
He then drove from Houston to New Orleans on the evening of the 31st, and he posted several videos to an online platform proclaiming his support for ISIS.
There were five videos posted on Jabbar’s Facebook account, which are timestamped, beginning at 1:29 AM and the last at 3:02 AM.
In the first video, Jabbar explains he originally planned to harm his family and friends but was concerned the news headlines would not focus on the, “war between the believers and the disbelievers.”
Additionally, he stated he had joined ISIS before this summer. He also provided a will and testament.
We have a couple of different scenes at the location. We have released the scene at Bourbon Street. That scene has been released. We also have a scene off Mandeville Street, where we’re currently searching.
FBI and ATF agents have secured that house, and that location is being searched for potential evidence. On New Year’s morning, Jabbar opened fire after ramming through a blocked-off area of Bourbon Street and used his truck as a weapon to run over the victims.
Teams of specially trained victim specialists, as I said earlier, are on the ground here in New Orleans assisting survivors of the attack and loved ones of the deceased. We do not believe the public is in any danger around any of these locations.
Three phones linked to Jabbar have been recovered, and digital media exploitation is a priority to see what is on the devices and determine if there are any other potential leads.
Additionally, we have recovered two laptops and are currently reviewing them for any potential leads. Those laptops were recovered at the Mandeville address.
Evidence technicians will also be going over the F-150 truck Jabbar was driving.
As you know, we recovered an ISIS flag from the back of the vehicle. Jabbar declared his support for the terrorist group on social media, as I stated before, as he made his way to New Orleans.
FBI bomb technicians also recovered two IEDs in coolers, one from the cross-section of Bourbon and Orleans Street, and the second at an intersection approximately two blocks away.
There were multiple reports of other devices. Those reports turned out to be misinformation or not actual functioning devices. Those are the only two devices that we’ve been able to recover that were functional.
Both devices were rendered safe on scene. We did obtain surveillance footage showing Jabbar placing the devices where they were found. As I said before, two other items of interest were determined not to be IEDs.
A little bit about Jabbar: Jabbar himself was born in the United States and is a U.S. military veteran. We are looking into everything in his life. While we have interviewed many people who know Jabbar, we still need to talk to others.
Whether you know Jabbar personally, worked with him, served in the military, or saw him in New Orleans or Texas, we need to talk to you. You may not think you have relevant information, but what you know could tie to one of our investigation leads.
Specifically, we want to talk to anyone who was in the French Quarter on New Year’s Eve or early on New Year’s Day.
That includes people spotted near one of the two IEDs on Bourbon Street. The IED was inside a cooler, and many people stopped and looked at the cooler and then continued on their way.
Let’s be clear again: we do not believe at this point these people are involved in this incident in any way. We want to speak to them as witnesses and want to know what they saw and when.
I went down to the crime scene last night. It is very hard to put into words what it looked like and how difficult it was to see.
Anyone with information can call us at 1-800-CALL-FBI or send digital tips to FBI.gov/bourbonstreetattack.
Early this morning, Evidence Response Teams finished their work at the crime scene. Bourbon Street has been turned over to the city of New Orleans.
As you know, there’s also an FBI investigation in Las Vegas. We are following up on all potential leads and not ruling everything out.
However, at this point, there is no definitive link between the attack here in New Orleans and the one in Las Vegas.
Again, as I close, I’ll preface everything with what I started with in the beginning: this is very early in an investigation like this.
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