NBC News – by Richard Esposito, Pete Williams and Matthew DeLuca
A man with ties to the Boston Marathon bombing suspect Tamerlan Tsarnaev was shot and killed after attacking an FBI agent during questioning in Florida, law enforcement officials said on Wednesday.
The man who was shot, Ibragim Todashev, 27, allegedly attacked an agent with a knife. He was not suspected of having played any role in the bombing that killed three people and injured scores more in April, but he did confess to being involved in a brutal Boston-area slaying two years ago, investigators said.
Law enforcement officials said Todashev was being questioned as part of the FBI’s effort to find and talk to anyone who had any contact with Tsarnaev, the older bombing suspect killed in a shootout with police.
The shooting occurred in the early morning hours on Wednesday, the FBI said in a statement.
“The agent, two Massachusetts State Police troopers, and other law enforcement personnel were interviewing an individual in connection with the Boston Marathon bombing investigation when a violent confrontation was initiated by the individual,” the statement said.
“During the confrontation, the individual was killed and the agent sustained non-life threatening injuries,” according to the statement.
Todashev, they say, had spent some time in the Boston area, where he was a mixed martial arts fighter, and knew Tsarnaev there. Investigators say he confessed to the agent in Florida that he played a role in a triple murder in 2011 in which three men were discovered slain in an apartment in Waltham, Mass.
Brendan Mess, 25; Raphael Teken, 37; and Eric Weissman, 31, were found with their throats cut in September of 2011, and their bodies were covered with marijuana. No suspects had been arrested in that case.
A spokesperson for the Middlesex County District Attorney’s office, which is investigating the three deaths, said that the office does not discuss ongoing investigations. Relatives for the three men did not immediately return requests for comment.
Officials say FBI agents were questioning Todashev on Tuesday. He was cooperative at first, they say, but later that night, he attacked the agent with a knife, who shot and killed him. Officials say Todashev became violent as he was about to sign a written statement based on his confession.
A man officials say knew the bombing suspect, Tamerlan Tsarnaev, was shot and killed in Orlando, Fla., when he allegedly attacked an FBI agent who traveled to Orlando to interview him. NBC’s Pete Williams reports.
The officials say Todashev had some connections with radical Chechen rebels, but they say it’s not clear whether he had any role in radicalizing Tsarnaev.
A friend of Todashev told NBC News affiliate WESH that he was being questioned along with the man who was shot due to their connections to the mixed martial arts community in Boston.
“They were talking to us, both of us, right? And they said they need him for a little more, for a couple more hours, and I left, and they told me they’re going to bring him back. They never brought him back,” friend Khusn Taramiv, 27, told WESH.
Todashev was arrested for aggravated battery on May 4, 2013 after getting into a fight over a parking spot with another man at Premium Outlets in Orlando, according to an Orange County Sheriff’s Office arrest affidavit.
Todashev said that he pushed the other man after he “got into his face,” according to the affidavit. The man’s son then “came at him swinging,” Todashev told police. The 5’9”, 160-pound Todashev admitted to police that he was a former mixed martial arts fighter, according to the arrest affidavit.
“This skill puts his fighting ability way above that of a normal person,” the arresting officer wrote in the affidavit.
Todashev was transported to the booking and release center without incident, according to the affidavit. His Miranda warning was read but not invoked, the document says. He was released May 5 on a $3,500 surety bond, according to the Orange County Corrections Department.
The man was born in Russia and had U.S. citizenship, according to the affidavit.
A spokesman for the Orlando Police Department referred all questions regarding the shooting to the FBI.
An FBI incident review team was dispatched from Washington, D.C., and was expected to arrive in Orlando within 24 hours, FBI Special Agent Dave Couvertier said on Wednesday morning.
FBI questioning at midnight is code for, “we shot the informant when he was asleep”.
Sounds about right there.
There was no body search performed?
There are drop guns and drop knives.
There is no way in hell that he got into an interrogation room with any weapons on him.
Great pulp fiction writing at NBC and the FBI. They must have a new writer on staff since the perp in question didn’t get suicided by shooting himself in the head from an impossible distance or angle. Maybe if NBC and the FBI pulled all their stories together in a fiction mystery novel people would read it for lurid entertainment. (Yes, this is sarcasm.)
Hi Enbe,
Actually,.. I think this was another Satuday Night Live Skit that has gone horribly wrong.
OR,…
Time to silence another witness that would expose the FBI/DHS had carried out the Boston “bombing”.
JD – US Marines – Another American murdered by the US Fed Gov’t.
Sorry, when I think about things, the writing comes off rather cryptic; I totally agree with you.
I’m not buying a word of it at this point. Most likely just more dis-info & lies from law enforcement, the FBI, NBC, etc.
Just when I thought this thing couldn’t smell any worse…..
So let me get this straight…we have a government that ignores our Constitution, wages war and kills innocents whenever and wherever it’s masters dictate…it tortures people…it TORTURES people…it spies on us 24/7 because it fears us, it lies, cheats and steals…it pulls false flags which may kill or maim women and children…and now it has sunk to the depths of depavity by killing someone to cover up it’s lies and/or false flags? My God…what has happened to this country? Have we become everything we once stood against?
Should we feel lucky that we still have one more step to go from the bottom rung? At least they still feel a need to concoct a story, no matter how implausible, to justify the murder. When they’re all way down they’ll just kill anyone they don’t like and kill you, too, if you question it. They are also “just” killing people onesy-twosy now; when they really get ramped up, it will be by the truckload. It is about 30 seconds to midnight on the countdown to tyranny, and way too many Americans are still soundly asleep.
The Federal Bureau of Israel is mopping up to make sure there are no loose ends….