AirTalk takes a deeper look into the shootings suspects and their motives, how the incident is impacting the Muslim community and the city of San Bernardino as a whole, and how rational our fears are of another shooting.
Determining the motive of the San Bernardino shooting
Twenty-four hours after the shooting rampage in San Bernardino, details are slowly starting to come out.
What we know is that the shooters have been identified as Syed Rizwan Farook and his partner Tashfeen Malik. We know they live in Redlands and have a 6-month old daughter. We know 28-year-old Farook worked as a health inspector and attended the party that was held at the Inland Regional Center. But what we still don’t know is their motive.
How do investigators go about determining a motive in such a case? Could a tragedy like what happened yesterday in San Bernardino be prevented or anticipated?
Read KPCC’s continuing coverage here.
Guests:
Erika Aguilar, KPCC Reporter in San Bernardino
Dr. Park Dietz, MD., MPH., PhD founder of the Threat Assessment Group, Inc., a forensic and consulting firm focusing on workplace violence and the risk of threats. He has testified and consulted in cases such as the assassination attempt on President Reagan and the Unabomber investigation
Colin P. Clarke, associate political scientist at the RAND Corporation, where his research focuses on national and international security; Author, “Terrorism, Inc.: The Financing of Terrorism, Insurgency, and Irregular Warfare” (Praeger Security International, 2015)
Community of San Bernardino impacted personally by massacre
Much still remains unknown about yesterday’s mass shooting in San Bernardino, but this morning the community is beginning the healing process and searching for more information about the circumstances surrounding the tragedy.
In the tightly-knit community about an hour east of Los Angeles, you’d be hard-pressed to find someone who is only a few degrees separated from victims of the shooting.
As part of our continuing coverage of the tragedy, AirTalk speaks with affected members of the community on how they are mentally, emotionally, and physically processing what happened.
Guests:
Chris Wong, a friend of a victim injured in the San Bernardino shooting
Larry Humphreys, executive director of Behavioral Autism Therapies
Rose Fuentes, Program Director, Interact Neurobehavior Program - which has worked with IRC for thirty years. Her husband Jose Fuentes, Clinical Neuropsychologist
Local Muslim leader on his community’s reaction to San Bernardino shooting
28-year-old Syed Rizwan Farook was described by coworkers as a devout Muslim who was rarely the one to start a conversation, but not as a religious fanatic.
Details are still emerging about the mass shooting that authorities say Farook and 27-year-old Tashfeen Malik carried out Wednesday morning at the Inland Regional Center in San Bernardino. Malik has been identified by a family member as Farook’s wife. Earlier, CNN reported that officials had told them that Farook had radicalized and was in touch with terror suspects, though the details are still unclear.
Today, we hear from a local Muslim religious leader on how the community is responding to the tragedy and where it will go from here.
Guest:
Sheikh Yassir Fazaga, religious leader of Orange County Islamic Foundation in Mission Viejo
The San Bernardino shootings: When fear overrides the reality of risk
For some Angelenos, the proximity of the San Bernardino shootings fills them with fear that they too might be caught in a mass shooting.
However the true risk of that occurring is very, very low. Nonetheless, the fear persists. Shark bites (1 in 11.5 million according University of Florida Shark Attack File) and plane crashes (1 in 5 million and up to 11 million depending on source) freak people out too, despite numbers supporting that dying from those things won’t happen to you.
In other words, numbers show there is far more safety in this world than peril.
Why can fear rule over the reality of risk? Have the shootings made you feel more scared to live in LA?
Guest:
David Ropeik, author of "How Risky is it Really? Why our Fears don’t Match the Facts" and an instructor of risk perception and communication at Harvard