The House Committee on Homeland Security wrote DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano a letter on Saturday demanding answers on the Boston Marathon bombing. This was after Tamerlan Tsarnaev became the fifth person since 9-11 to participate in terrorist activities despite being under federal investigation.
DHS Committee Chairman Rep. Mike McCaul told reporters Saturday that we are “probably looking at a terrorist cell” being involved in the Boston attack.
FOX News reported:
A Republican-led House committee is asking the Obama administration for all information on the Boston bombing suspect once flagged for possible radical ties, saying the tragedy marks another intelligence failure and raises “serious questions about the efficacy of the federal counter-terrorism efforts.”
The letter was sent Saturday by the House Committee on Homeland Security to Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, National Intelligence Director James Clapper and FBI Director Robert Mueller.
In the letter, Committee Chairman Rep. Mike McCaul said bombing suspect Tamerlan Tsarnaev appears to be the fifth person since 9/11 to participate in a terror attack, despite being under FBI investigation.
McCaul, R-Texas, said the incidents “raise the most serious questions about the efficacy of the federal counter terrorism efforts.”
Tsarnaev, 26, was killed early Friday morning in a police shootout. His 19-year-old brother, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, was captured by police that night and remains in the hospital.
The older Tsarnaev was interviewed by the FBI in 2011 before a six-month overseas trip, including time in Russia. In addition, he posted jihadist material on his social media site.
On Saturday, two U.S. law enforcement officials said the FBI was acting on information from the Russian intelligence security service that Tamerlan Tsarnaev was a follower of radical Islam.
“Yet Tsarnaev remained at liberty in this country to conduct the Boston attack, and it took days to publicly identify him as a suspect,” wrote McCaul, who wants the information by Friday.
The Wall Street Journal has a list of the five terrorists who were under federal investigation before they acted.
Tamerlan Tsarnaev is the fifth person since 9/11 who has participated in terror attacks after questioning by the FBI. He was preceded by Nidal Hasan; drone casualty Anwar al Awlaki; Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad (born Carlos Leon Bledsoe), who murdered an Army recruit in Little Rock in June 2009; and David Coleman Headley, who provided intelligence to the perpetrators of the Mumbai massacre in 2008.
