TerrorismFBI arrests wife of Orlando shooter Omar Mateen

Noor Salman, the wife of Omar Mateen, the gunman who carried out the deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history when he killed forty-nine people at an Orlando, Florida, night club, was arrested by the FBI in San Francisco.

NBC News reports that she is expected to face charges of aiding and abetting and obstruction of justice. 

Salman had told investigators that she tried to stop Mateen from committing the attack, but new evidence has caused the FBI to want to question her again.

“I can confirm the arrest did occur,” Attorney General Loretta Lynch said on MSNBC.

“This is a matter that we continue to take very seriously,” she said. “We said from the beginning we were going to look at every aspect of this case, every aspect of this shooters life — to determine not just why did he take these actions, but who else knew about them, was anyone else involved, is there any other accountability that needs to be had here in this case.”

The FBI suspected she had prior knowledge of the attack, but that she failed to reach out to law enforcement in order to try and thwart it. It now emerges that she was likely with her husband when he bought ammunition, and that she accompanied Mateen on at least one visit to Pulse before the 12 June attack. 

Phone records also show that Mateen and Salman exchanged text messages during the shooting.