See Newsday's latest news and stories related to the bombings that occurred in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan and Seaside Park, N.J., on Saturday, Sept. 17, 2016.

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New York

Convicted Chelsea bomber Ahmad Khan Rahimi received a mandatory life sentence in Manhattan federal court on Tuesday for planting bombs in 2016 that injured 30 people, and a tongue-lashing from the judge and a victim for failing to show an ounce of remorse.
The sentence imposed by U.S. District Judge Richard Berman was a foregone conclusion ever since Rahimi’s conviction last year on eight federal charges, including one carrying a mandatory 30-year prison term and another requiring a consecutive life sentence.
Rahimi, 30, an Afghan-American from Elizabeth, New Jersey, wore a blue prison smock and white cap and smiled and chuckled with his lawyer during the sentencing. 
He didn’t mention the bombings in his statement to the judge.
Instead, in a conversational voice, Rahimi complained about a series of experiences — prison issues, Muslims getting “harassed” at airports, and alleged FBI failings when his father alerted authorities to his radicalism — that he suggested showed the United States wasn’t what it claimed to be.
“I came to the U.S. when I was 7 years old. I didn’t come here harboring any hatred of anyone,” Rahimi said. “ . . . I didn’t grow up hating anyone — not a color, not a creed, not a religion.”
Berman, who imposed sentences of life and then 30 years in prison to be finished before a final mandatory life sentence, was perplexed.
“You sound reasonable enough, yet your actions are totally at odds with how you’re speaking in court,” Berman said. “It’s really puzzling.”
The judge continued: “I didn’t hear anything, not an ounce of justification, for what you did. There’s no comparison from these slights or grievances you might feel and the actions you took as the Chelsea bomber . . . One thing a life sentence does is to make sure you can’t do it again.”
Rahimi was convicted of the Sept. 17, 2016, planting of homemade pressure-cooker bombs on West 23rd Street and West 27th Street. The West 23rd Street bomb, packed with ball bearings, caused injuries across a 650-square-foot crime scene, crumpled and catapulted a nearby trash bin, and broke windows three stories up.
No one died. The West 27th Street bomb was disabled before going off. Rahimi also allegedly left six pipe bombs at a New Jersey train station that were found and disabled, and allegedly put a bomb near a Seaside Park, New Jersey, 5K race. It detonated when runners would have been passing but for a delayed start.
The courtroom Tuesday was filled with victims, several of whom testified at his trial last year. Only one spoke at the sentencing — Pauline Nelson, a personal trainer from Brooklyn who was driving on West 23rd Street when the bomb exploded, leaving her children terrified.
Nelson told Rahimi she too was an immigrant — a single mother with four children who struggled like he had — but scorned his behavior in court.
“You laugh with your lawyer. You’ve no apology for what you’ve done,” she said, glaring at a sheepish Rahimi. “You have no remorse. God forgive you.”
Rahimi, a father of three who worked at his family’s chicken fast-food restaurant, has been in jail since his release from a hospital in 2016, after treatment of wounds suffered when he was apprehended in a shootout with police in Linden, New Jersey.
His father, Mohammad, who has denounced Rahimi’s violence, came to the sentencing and afterward repeated his son’s complaint, telling reporters his son was increasingly radicalized by civilian deaths in Afghanistan but that officials did nothing when he asked for help in 2014. 
“I said he needs some help,” the father said. “Wash his brain. And the government never helped.”
Law enforcement officials said quick action in the case would help deter terrorism.
“Less than a year and a half after his attacks, Rahimi has now been tried, convicted, and sentenced to life in prison,” said interim Manhattan U.S. Attorney Geoffrey Berman.
Rahimi still faces federal charges in New Jersey relating to the bombs he allegedly planted there, and state charges in New Jersey stemming from his shootout with Linden police officers when he was captured.

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Chelsea bomber sentenced to mandatory life in prison

Chelsea bomber sentenced to life in prison

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The government is nearing the end of its case in the Chelsea bombing trial of Ahmad Khan Rahimi and jurors are likely to hear summations and get the case by Friday, the judge said on Wednesday.
After a day that included testimony from a DNA expert linking one of the bombs in Manhattan and similar bombs left in New Jersey to Rahimi, Manhattan U.S. District Judge Richard Berman said prosecutors will finish on Thursday. The extent of the defense case isn’t yet clear. 
Rahimi, 29, of Elizabeth, New Jersey, is accused of planting a pressure cooker bomb on West 23d Street that injured 30 people when it blew up Sept. 17, 2016, and another bomb that didn’t detonate on West 27th Street. He is separately charged in New Jersey with planting bombs there and a police shootout.
The trial previously featured testimony from victims of the blast, multiple videos of a person who looked like Rahimi apparently leaving suitcases on West 23rd and West 27th streets, and fingerprint evidence. It began on Oct. 2.

NYBOMB1012

Chelsea bombing trial prosecution to rest Thursday, judge says

Judge: Prosecution to rest in  bombing trial

Ahmad Khan Rahami

Lawyers for accused Chelsea bomber Ahmad Khan Rahimi urged a federal judge on Tuesday to limit testimony about his alleged terrorist motives and keep the government from calling an expert to testify about Osama bin Laden and ISIS at the New Jersey man’s scheduled October trial.
“The government wants to now add on to the indictment this gloss of terrorism,” defense lawyer Sabrina Shroff told U.S. District Judge Richard Berman in Manhattan. “They want to inject that into a case that is already volatile enough.”
Rahimi, 29, of Elizabeth, New Jersey, is accused of planting two pressure-cooker bombs in Chelsea last Sept. 17, one of which exploded and injured 30 people. He is also accused in New Jersey of planting bombs there, and starting a shootout with police when he was captured.
He is charged with using a weapon of mass destruction and explosives, and property-destruction crimes, but not terrorism or aiding a terrorist group.
Prosecutors say they are entitled to show his motive and want an expert to testify about a journal in which Rahimi praised bin Laden and other terror groups and figures.
Prosecutor Shawn Crowley said the journal entry referencing bin Laden was a “letter” to the government.
“It’s the defendant’s claim of responsibility,” she said. “It’s the defendant telling the government what he did and why he did it.”
Shroff said the case should focus on to the facts of what happened last September. Expert testimony about bin Laden and others named in the journal — such as the late al-Qaida recruiter Anwar al-Awlaki and Fort Hood shooter Nidal Hasan — would be too prejudicial, she said.
“I think everyone knows who Osama bin Laden is, or was,” Shroff said. “I really don’t think we need that.”
In addition to limiting terrorism evidence, Rahimi’s lawyers want Berman to dismiss a charge of using a destructive device during a crime of violence, which carries a mandatory life sentence. They say the law doesn’t apply to a bombing with no other crime of violence.
Berman said he would announce his rulings on Thursday.

NYTERR0621

Accused Chelsea bomber’s lawyers want no terror experts at trial

Lawyers: No terror experts at bombing trial 

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Anthony M. DeStefano

A firm trial date in the federal case against accused Chelsea bomber Ahmad Khan Rahimi is still uncertain despite continuous prodding by a judge of both defense attorneys and prosecutors.
At a hearing Tuesday in Manhattan federal court, Judge Richard M. Berman expressed mild irritation, primarily with Rahimi’s defense team, over the pace of pretrial activity. 
Rahimi, of Elizabeth, New Jersey, was indicted in November on terrorism charges stemming from the Sept. 17 pressure cooker bombing in Chelsea that injured 31 people. He faces similar charges for a device that exploded causing injuries before a charity run in New Jersey. 
Rahimi, 29, also faces numerous counts of attempted murder in New Jersey stemming from a shootout he had with cops on Sept. 19, when he was wounded and captured.
Berman said in court that when he asks the defense how far along it is reviewing the digitally stored evidence — estimated at 6 terabytes of computer capacity — he doesn’t get a firm answer.
“I leave conferences bewildered,” the judge said.
Federal defender David Patton said he and co-counsel Sabrina Shroff and Peggy Cross-Goldenberg weren’t trying to be evasive but that it’s difficult to say how much discovery material exists.
Rahimi, who took months to recuperate from his wounds, walked on his own into court dressed in prison garb. 
In a letter filed with the court, the defense said the government’s proposed March 27 trial date doesn’t allow enough time to prepare. On average, cases in the Manhattan court take more than 13 months from first appearance to get to trial, the letter said.
The defense asked that the court not set a trial date earlier than Dec. 4.
Berman asked both sides to meet and try to agree on when pretrial motions and a trial date can be set. He adjourned the case until March 2.

NYTERR0201

No trial date in sight for accused Chelsea bomber Ahmad Rahimi

No trial date set for accused Chelsea bomber  

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A prosecutor in the case of accused Chelsea bomber Ahmad Khan Rahimi on Monday urged a judge to impose special protections on materials to be turned over to the defense because they include evidence of an “ongoing investigation” of “targets that are domestically located.”
Prosecutor Emil Bove, who made the remark at a hearing in federal court in Manhattan, did not explicitly say the ongoing investigation related to Rahimi’s alleged bombing spree last summer, but if it does it would be the first official indication others may be drawn into his case.
The government also told U.S. District Judge Richard Berman some of the so-called discovery materials to be given to Rahimi’s lawyers required special handling because they include details on how Rahimi carried out the attack that could be useful to terrorists.
“The discovery is going to include materials that do relate to ongoing investigations, including an investigation of some targets domestically located, and also contains materials that could be used by others to create other situations that compromise public safety and national security, and what I am talking about here are follow-on attacks,” Bove said.
The office of U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara declined to offer clarification of the remarks.
Prosecutors want to mark some of the discovery in the case “confidential” and prohibit the defense from disclosing it to witnesses without permission from Berman. Defense lawyer Sabrina Shroff argued that, without more specifics, the condition could improperly hamper the defense.
But Bove said the procedure would be limited to matters relating to the ongoing investigation and other “sensitive materials” including “evidence of radicalization, attack planning, evidence relating to funding and financing, bomb building and communications methods, and evidence relating to communications security.”
Rahimi, 28, of Elizabeth, New Jersey, is accused of planting two pressure cooker bombs in Chelsea. One detonated, injuring more than 30. He also planted bombs in New Jersey, which didn’t detonate, and then was captured after a shootout with police in Linden, New Jersey.
His lawyers have complained that the shootout left Rahimi with severe medical injuries, including a leg wound, a disabled hand and liver damage. He hobbled in court Monday with a limp that was more severe than it was during his first appearance in Manhattan last month.
Rahimi is charged alone in his nine-count indictment, which includes charges of detonating a weapon of massive destruction but no conspiracy allegation.

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Rahimi bombing case linked to other ‘targets,’ prosecutor says

Prosecutor: Rahimi case linked to other ‘targets’

Ahmad Khan Rahami -- cropped

The federal terror trial of accused Chelsea bomber Ahmad Khan Rahimi could begin in the late winter or early spring of 2017, a prosecutor said Thursday.
Speaking at Rahimi’s arraignment in Manhattan federal court on an eight-count terrorism indictment stemming from the Sept. 17 bombings in Seaside Heights, New Jersey, and Manhattan which injured 31, Assistant U.S. Attorney Nicholas Lewin indicated to Judge Richard Berman during a hearing that a possible trial could be only four months away.
Minutes earlier, Rahimi, 28, had shuffled into court, apparently still hobbled from injuries he received in when he was seriously wounded in a shootout with police in New Jersey during his capture Sept. 19. Rahimi, who looked frail, also coughed quietly and sipped water from a foam cup.
Defense attorney Peggy Cross-Goldenberg entered a not guilty plea on Rahimi’s behalf and told Berman her client had unspecified medical issues that needed to be addressed. Rahimi, who also is known as Mohammad Rahimi, is being held in Manhattan at the federal Metropolitan Correctional Center.
Lewin noted that prosecutors were putting together evidence to turn over to the defense, including a montage of video surveillance images which he said show Rahimi planting pressure cooker bombs in Chelsea. One bomb detonated near a metal trash bin, but another unexploded device was found on West 23rd Street. The New Jersey explosion, which took place just before the start of a local road race, didn’t injure anyone.
While the case invoked federal terrorism statutes, Lewin said it was not expected that there would be any classified materials used by the government. 
Rahimi also faces attempted murder charges in New Jersey state court related to the shootout with police.
Berman set the next court date in Manhattan for Dec. 19. Cross-Goldenberg declined to comment to reporters.

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Prosecutor tells judge  Chelsea bombing case could start in 4 months

Prosecutor: Bomb case could start in 4 months

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Alleged Chelsea bomber Ahmad Khan Rahimi was indicted Wednesday in federal court in Manhattan on eight explosives and terrorism-related counts that could lead to a mandatory life sentence.
The indictment largely tracked a criminal complaint filed against Rahimi last month in New York, but added two counts of using a destructive device during a crime of violence — one for each of two bombs he’s accused of planting in Manhattan — that could require life in prison if he is convicted on both. 
“The bomb that exploded in Chelsea shattered windows hundreds of yards away and propelled a 100-pound trash bin over 120 feet, injuring over 30 people,” Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said in a statement. “Now indicted by a grand jury, Rahimi will face justice in a federal court for his alleged violent acts of terrorism.”
Rahimi, 28, of Elizabeth, New Jersey, is accused of planting a bomb on West 23d Street that exploded, and another on West 27th Street that didn’t on Sept. 17. He also planted bombs in New Jersey, and on Sept. 19 was captured in Linden, New Jersey, after a shootout with police there.
After being hospitalized in New Jersey for more than a month, he was brought to Manhattan federal court for an initial appearance last week, and will be in court again on Thursday to enter a plea to the indictment.
He has also been charged with bomb-related offenses that could carry a mandatory life sentence in New Jersey federal court, and with attempted murder of police officers in New Jersey state court. But the Manhattan case will be tried first.
Rahimi also is charged in Manhattan with using a weapon of mass destruction and attempting to do so, bombing a place of public use, destroying property by means of explosive and attempting to do so, and interstate transportation of explosives.
Lawyers for Rahimi did not respond to a request for comment.

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Accused Chelsea bomber Ahmad Khan Rahimi indicted

Accused Chelsea bomber indicted

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Accused Chelsea bomber Ahmad Khan Rahimi pleaded not guilty through his lawyer to attempted murder charges in New Jersey Superior Court on Thursday, making his first appearance before a judge through a video hookup from his hospital room.
Sitting up in his hospital bed, Rahimi answered “Yes” to a series of standard questions from Judge Regina Caulfield about whether he understood the charges and his rights, looking briefly at public defender Peter Liguori before each answer.
Rahimi, 28, faces five counts of attempted murder of a law enforcement officer and weapons charges stemming from a Sept. 19 shootout with Linden police that ended with his capture. He has been hospitalized for treatment of multiple gunshot wounds since then.
He is being held on $5.2 million bail. The judge did not set a date for his next court appearance and received no update on his medical condition, but Rahimi showed no visible signs of distress during the brief hearing.
The judge presided in an Elizabeth, N.J., courtroom filled with media, including some foreign media. Officer Angel Padilla, one of the officers wounded in the shootout, attended along with seven other Linden cops.
Liguori, at the start of the hearing, said his client — originally charged and widely reported in the press as “Rahami” – actually spelled his name Rahimi.
Rahimi also faces explosives charges in both Manhattan and New Jersey federal courts. Authorities say he planted two bombs in Chelsea, one of which injured 31 when it exploded last month, and other bombs in the Garden State.
No date has been set for his appearances in the two federal cases.

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NYC bombing suspect Ahmad Rahimi pleads not guilty in shootout

Bombing suspect pleads not guilty to shooting

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The father of Chelsea bombing suspect Ahmad Khan Rahami has requested a public defender in New Jersey to represent his son, who remains hospitalized, unconscious and unable to speak, according to a letter the lawyer filed with a state judge on Thursday.
Public defender Peter Liguori, in a letter Thursday to a New Jersey Superior Court judge dated Sept. 22, said Rahami’s father, Mohammad Rahami, asked for his office to represent his son.
Liguori wrote that prosecutors wouldn’t let him visit with Rahami because Rahami remained unconscious.
Rahami, suspected of planting the Chelsea bomb and another in Seaside Park, New Jersey, was hospitalized in New Jersey after he was wounded in a shootout with police on Monday. The state has charged him with five counts of attempted murder of a law enforcement officer. 
The 28-year-old Rahami also faces federal terrorism charges in Manhattan federal court, where a legal technicality prevents the appointment of a federal defender there, according to court records.
As a result of his incapacity, Rahami was unable to make a scheduled court appearance Thursday in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Liguori wrote.
Since there was no court appearance, Liguori filed the letter with Judge Regina Caulfield to signal his representation of the defendant.
In the Manhattan federal court case, Magistrate Judge Gabriel W. Gorenstein ruled on Wednesday that since Rahami is technically not in federal custody, the court cannot appoint him a federal public defender to handle the New York charges.

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Public defender asks to meet with bombing suspect Ahmad Rahami

Public defender asks to meet with bombing suspect

Accused Chelsea bomber Ahmad Khan Rahami has remained mostly unconscious since he was wounded in a Monday shootout with police, preventing federal agents from questioning him, authorities said Thursday.
Also Thursday, the Elizabeth, New Jersey, man’s father provided more details about his sons interest in international terror groups and new footage surfaced showing two men picking up a bag investigators said Rahami left in Manhattan on Saturday night.
Rahami, 38, faces a range of federal charges in connection with the bombings Saturday in Manhattan and Seaside Park, New Jersey.
He, also faces charges of attempted murder of a police officer after the Monday morning gunfight in New Jersey with Linden police officers.
Authorities told The Associated Press on Thursday that the severity of Rahami’s injuries in the shootout — in which police said he shot and wounded a Linden officer — have kept investigators from interviewing him.
His injuries did not prevent federal public defenders from asking a magistrate to allow him to be brought to federal court and be given a lawyer. 
Wednesday night, a federal magistrate in Manhattan denied the request. In his order, U.S. Magistrate Gabriel Gorenstein, said Rahami did not need to be brought to federal court because New Jersey police arrested him and he was not entitled to a lawyer on the federal charges because he isn’t in federal custody.
David Patton, the chief federal defender in Manhattan, had argued that it was improper to hold and question him without a court appearance and without a lawyer.
Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said Wednesday that his office had asked U.S. marshals to bring Rahami to federal court, subject to his medical condition and other factors. No immediate court appearance or lawyer was required because he is in custody on New Jersey charges, Bharara said.
Gorenstein sided with the government. “Whether there are federal authorities questioning defendant does not address the issue of custody,” he wrote in his brief two-page order.
“At this point, the Court has no evidence whatsoever from anyone with personal knowledge that the defendant is being detained by any federal officer,” he added. “Accordingly, this Court lacks authority to appoint counsel.”
Tuesday, the FBI revealed that Rahami’s father, Mohammad Rahami told agents two years ago he suspected his son was a terrorist. In an interview Thursday with The New York Times, he said he warned agents his son was watching al-Qaida and Taliban videos. FBI officials said agents found nothing tying the younger Rahami to terrorism.
WCBS reported Thursday that investigators suspect Rahami had cased the Chelsea location two days before the blast while WNBC showed new video of two men picking up a travel bag Saturday night on West 27th Street that investigators said contained an explosive device left by Rahami. 
The NYPD has said they don’t consider the two men suspects but want to speak with them and inspect the piece of luggage for possible evidence. The footage shows two men removing the device and walking off with the travel bag.
Some time later three men walk by and one of them kicks the device.
Prosecutors allege that Rahami bought bomb materials including timers, explosive precursors and ball bearings on eBay over the summer, and may have conducted a practice explosion in a family member’s Elizabeth, New Jersey, backyard two days before the Chelsea bombings. 
They also allege that when he was arrested after the Linden gunfight he had a handwritten journal whose last entry included a coda of sorts: “The sounds of the bombs will be heard in the streets. Gun shots to your police. Death to your OPPRESSION.”

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Fed magistrate denies request to bring Chelsea bomber to court

Bid denied to bring accused bomber to court

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The NYPD was searching Wednesday for two men captured on a surveillance camera removing an explosive device from a travel bag on a Manhattan street Saturday, blocks from where investigators said Ahmad Khan Rahami left a bomb in a garbage container before it blew up.
A photo released by the NYPD shows the two men walking side-by-side, in the hope that someone will come forward to identify them. 
Investigators said the pair came upon the airline travel bag Saturday night, took the device out, and continued on with the luggage. Police said they want to examine the bag for possible evidence connected to the Chelsea bombing but the men are not considered suspects.
“They are witnesses,” said NYPD chief James Waters, who heads the department’s counterterrorism operations. “There are no criminal charges. They are not in jeopardy of being arrested.” 
Waters asked the two men to contact police and also requested that anyone who might know them to reach out to detectives.
The Chelsea bomb detonated at about 8:30 p.m. Saturday on West 23rd Street, injuring 29 people and setting off an intense multiagency manhunt that ended two days later with the arrest of Rahami in Linden, New Jersey after a shootout with police officers. 
Rahami shot and wounded an officer who returned fire, hitting the bombing suspect.
Shortly after the Chelsea blast, the unexploded device was found on West 27th Street.
A request by the NYPD for information on the men came as local and federal law enforcement continued hunting for clues in the Chelsea bombing and a blast earlier Saturday in Seaside Park, New Jersey. 
A complex web of legal proceedings also emerged Wednesday in the case against Rahami, an Elizabeth, New Jersey resident facing a wide range of federal and state charges. And in New Jersey, those who did business with Rahami’s family or knew him from their fried chicken restaurant offered up a portrait that belied the image of him depicted in court papers as a man bent on waging globally-inspired terrorism in New York and New Jersey.
The FBI continued Wednesday with their theory that Rahami acted alone but were not closing off the possibility that he had help, said William Sweeney, the new FBI Special Agent in Charge for the New York office.
“As far as whether he’s a lone actor,” Sweeney said, “that’s still the path we are following but we’re keeping all the options open.”
U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said the first prosecution of Rahami will take place in Manhattan federal court, and his office has filed court papers to have U.S. Marshals bring the 28-year-old from New Jersey where he remained hospitalized Wednesday.
“This is the appropriate and right place for the case to proceed initially,” Bharara said, adding that the most damage occurred in Manhattan, despite bombs blowing up in New Jersey and Rahami engaging in a shootout when he was caught.
Investigators have said that Rahami placed an explosive device in Seaside Park Saturday morning before the start of a charity running race. No one was injured when the device detonated but the race was canceled.
Late Tuesday night, the chief public defender in Manhattan asked a magistrate to order the government to promptly bring Rahami to court on a four-count federal terrorism complaint filed late Tuesday. Federal prosecutors in New Jersey filed six counts against Rahami Tuesday connected to the Seaside Park bombing and the discovery of an explosive-laden package Sunday night in Elizabeth, New Jersey.
Rahami has been in the custody of New Jersey authorities since the shootout. Union County prosecutors Monday charged Rahami with multiple counts of attempted murder of a police officer and unlawful possession of a weapon. His bail was set at $5.2 million.
“Mr. Rahami has already been held on extremely serious state charges in New Jersey for over 36 hours without the benefit of counsel,” chief federal defender David Patton said in a letter to Magistrate Gabriel Gorenstein, of United States District Court for the Southern District of New York in Manhattan.
Patton wrote to the magistrate that Rahami “has been held and questioned by federal law enforcement agents since his arrest. The Sixth Amendment requires that he be given access to counsel on the federal charges, and that he be presented without delay.”
Bharara said that since Rahami has not been arrested by federal agents they are not in control of him.
“As a legal matter, the defendant is in the custody of a local authority,” Bharara said.
Bharara said he didn’t know when Rahami would be brought to federal court — citing “operational issues” with the marshals, the fact that the suspected bomber is in the custody of local authorities in New Jersey, as well as his medical condition.
“We don’t expect it’ll be very long,” Bharara said, “but I can’t tell you precisely.”
Prosecutors from Bharara’s office argued in a letter filed in court Wednesday that it is premature for the federal public defender to be appointed to represent Rahami. The filing of a federal complaint did not trigger his right to counsel, the letter stated. Neither Bharara nor the letter addressed the claim that he is being questioned without a lawyer.
Bharara also dismissed statements from some in Congress that Rahami should be treated as an “enemy combatant” rather than facing trial in a civilian court with a full array of rights.
“What the law currently allows and dictates . . . is that we handle it in precisely the way we are handling it,” he said.
In Perth Amboy, New Jersey, Wednesday, Frank Salado, 69, said he sold his pizzeria there to the Rahami family about 15 years ago. It’s now a fried chicken restaurant but it was unclear if the Rahami family still owned it.
Shock was how Salado described his reaction to seeing Rahami’s photograph on news reports Monday.
“He seemed like a normal person,” he said of Rahami. “He used to be clean shaven. I never saw him with a beard before. I wouldn’t recognize him with the beard.”
Down the street, Girish Dalal, 66, who works at a pharmacy, said he remembered Ahmad Rahami working at the restaurant for several months about two years ago.
“He was fine,” Dalal said. “He was very professional. He never got mad or nothing.”
About a year ago, Rahami stopped by the pharmacy, Dalal said, adding that he asked Rahami if he wanted to buy a lottery ticket.
“He said no. ‘It was against my religion,’ ” Dahal recalled Rahami telling him. “He wouldn’t play the lottery.”

NYBLAS0922

Chelsea bombing: FBI seek 2 who removed IED for questioning

FBI: 2 who removed IED sought for questioning

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Bart Jones

Bombing suspect Ahmad Khan Rahami had a history of conflict with the mother of a child they had together and was constantly in arrears on child support, according to court papers.
The woman, Maria J. Mena of Edison, New Jersey, had not seen Rahami in person for two years and had not talked to him since January, the documents state.
She said she suddenly saw him again on Monday — on television news broadcasts — wounded and bleeding from police bullets as the suspect in bombings in New York and New Jersey.
On Tuesday, Mena filed papers in Superior Court of New Jersey requesting full custody of their child.
Mena stated as her reason that Rahami, 28, of Elizabeth, “has been charged with police attempted murder, and is currently under protective services after possible terrorist related activity in NYC 9/17/16.”
Other Superior Court papers show that Rahami had long been accused of failing to pay child support to Mena. In 2015, for instance, court papers indicated he was $3,546 in arrears. At one point, in 2008, a judge ordered that Rahami’s wages be garnished to pay the support.
Other papers discussed parenting time each parent would receive with the child, with Mena assigned Christmas and Thanksgiving and Rahami assigned the Muslim holy days of Eid al-Fitr and Eid al-Adha.
In 2012, the parents were ordered not to take the child out of the state or the country without the permission of the other parent or the court.
In a court ruling in 2011, Mena’s request to deny overnight parenting to Rahami was rejected, with the judge saying there was no evidence supporting Mena’s claim that the child was in danger of being removed from the country.
On Tuesday, two Edison Police Department patrol vehicles — an SUV and a sedan — were parked in front of Mena’s single-story house. Two uniformed officers were standing guard.
Reporters camped out across the residential street, but no one emerged from the house.
With Andrew Smith

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Mother of bombing suspect’s child seeks full custody

Bombing suspect has child custody conflict 

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Phase one of the Chelsea bombing investigation ended Monday when suspect Ahmad Khan Rahami was taken into custody in New Jersey after quick and impressive police work.
It was a tense few days — three bombs, one unexploded, another undetonated bag of pipe bombs, all of which were ultimately connected to one person. There were injuries, but mostly there were close calls.
Officials said their investigation continues to look for a motive and other possible conspirators, but there was no indication that Rahami was part of a terror cell. No link to foreign actors wasestablished.
That, however, didn’t prevent the quick politicization of the bombing spree. The fight over its ramifications could be seen in the inevitable statements and accusations and fast-moving conclusions from nearly every politician who stepped in front of a microphone.
While most gave the deserved tribute to the resiliency of the tri-state area, there was also a raging debate about whether to call the situation “terrorism” or at what point. 
Some officials, like Mayor Bill de Blasio, appeared leery to use the loaded word early on even to describe an act that seemed designed to inspire terror, perhaps given the words’ connotations — fear and panic, but also an association with Islam due to the predominance of the Islamic State. 
Caution is important, because unlike terror attacks sponsored by foreign nationals, recent attacks carried out by U.S. citizens are trickier to track, prevent or even explain. Those who carry out terrorism in this fashion might actually be motivated by any number of grievances, in addition to or instead of extremism. Naming them Islamic terrorists — or even bombing the Islamic State — does not necessarily stop inspired attacks. 
Yet such caution in characterization, which did not impede the investigation, was lambasted by Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump and others as political correctness run amok. Meanwhile, Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton said Trump’s anti-Muslim rhetoric serves as a recruiting tool for militants. So a potentially tragic event quickly got on the fast track to being another marker of messy national division. Disappointing.
The bombs have now been subsumed into our messy current discussions. On Monday, for example, the campaign account of Rep. Lee Zeldin, a former major in the U.S. Army, tweeted after Rahami’s capture: “You are welcome Colin Kaepernick.” Kaepernick is the NFL quarterback who has refused to stand for the national anthem to protest systemic racism.
The semantics won’t be what keeps Americans safe. Safety comes from swift and efficient old-fashioned police work and deep intelligence that so often brings suspects like this one to justice. And it comes by remaining rational and focused on the issue at hand, not needlessly dividing or alienating. Failing to do so would be a disturbing result and distressing capstone to the events in New York and New Jersey. — The editorial board

Opinion

Editorials

VPBOMB0920

Don’t let political division be legacy of Chelsea bombing probe

Editorial: Don’t let division be legacy of bombing probe

607796656-linden / jcm

A combination of high-tech police work, social media and a chance encounter on a New Jersey street led to the arrest Monday of Chelsea bombing suspect Ahmad Khan Rahami after a shootout with police, law enforcement officials said.
The breakneck speed with which Rahami, 28, was finally captured — just 50 hours after the blast in Manhattan’s Chelsea neighborhood Saturday night as well as one he is believed to have set earlier that day in Seaside Park, New Jersey — capped a feverish two-day investigation by the federal Joint Terrorism Task Force which employed numerous levels of technology, as well as cops pounding the pavement.
“A lot of technology was involved in this but [also] a lot of good old-fashioned police work between the FBI, NYPD and members of the Joint Terrorism Task Force,” new NYPD Commissioner James O’Neill said at a news conference Monday in Manhattan.
Assistant director in charge William F. Sweeney Jr., who heads the FBI office in Manhattan, said several hundred law enforcement officials were involved in the case.
“Based on our evidence collection and other analysis,” he said, the JTTF quickly focused on Rahami, as well as a car carrying five people Sunday night that was stopped as it traveled into Brooklyn from New Jersey and Staten Island. The people in the car were questioned for several hours in Manhattan and finally released without being arrested, Sweeney said. He wouldn’t elaborate on their statements, but Rep. Peter King (R-Seaford) said the five people were Rahami’s family. “They were family members who left the house last night,” King said. “They gave very significant information to the FBI.”
Sweeney declined to disclose what law enforcement techniques were used. But based on his emphasis on “evidence collection” and what he said was “other analysis,” it appeared that the Chelsea bomb on West 23rd Street, the unexploded device found by a photographer on West 27th Street with a cellphone and the device that detonated in Seaside Park provided either DNA or fingerprint evidence leading investigators to Rahami, said another law enforcement official who declined to be named. King said the malfunctioned device allowed investigators to find a fingerprint and the mobile phone that they traced to Rahami.
With Rahami identified as a prime suspect, officials resurrected a photograph of him. After JTTF investigators searched locations linked to Rahami in Elizabeth and Perth Amboy, New Jersey, the decision was made to widely disseminate his photograph early Monday morning on social media — a rarely used tool — and to law enforcement in a “BOLO,” which stands for “be on the lookout for.” 
According to law enforcement officials, a woman in Linden, New Jersey, had seen the photo of Rahami and thought he resembled a man sleeping in the foyer of Merdie’s Tavern on East Elizabeth Avenue. She called police and about 10:30 a.m. a police officer went to rouse the man, later identified as Rahami.
“He [the officer] went to rouse the person, who was sitting in the doorway,” Linden police Capt. James Sarnicki said Monday in an interview. “When the person lifted up his head, he saw that the person had a beard and resembled the individual that’s on the wanted poster that was circulated by the FBI and other law enforcement agencies.”
The officer then said “show me your hands,” at which point Rahami went to his side, pulled out a handgun and fired a round at the officer, striking him in the abdomen area, Sarnicki said. The officer was struck in his protective vest and didn’t suffer serious injuries. More police arrived and a short gunfight followed in which Rahami was wounded in the arm and leg and taken into custody, Sarnicki said. None of the police officers was identified.
NYPD investigators tried to use facial recognition software to identify Rahami, but the images of him captured on surveillance cameras around the bombing sites were either too grainy or didn’t show his face at the proper angle to compare his image to databases, the law enforcement official said.
NYPD spokesman Stephen Davis said the task force was able to develop leads quickly because of the way the crime scenes were preserved.
Special agent Michael Whitaker of the FBI office in Newark, which is part of the task force, said the Rahami case shows how important social media have become as a law enforcement tool, particularly when it allows the public to provide leads.
For O’Neill, who was formally sworn in as the 43rd police commissioner Monday by Mayor Bill de Blasio, the bombing case was his baptism by fire and also reaffirmed the importance of social media.
“If we can get everybody in the city engaged in helping us and keeping safe, that is the way to go, this is the wave of the future,” O’Neill said. 
With Chau Lam and Tom Brune

NYINVE0920

How bomb suspect Ahmad Khan Rahami was caught in just 50 hours

How Rahami was caught in 50 hours

IMGQ3U5_WEB / mg

Chelsea bombing suspect Ahmad Khan Rahami wrote of “Brother Osama Bin Laden,” declared “Death To Your OPPRESSION,” and worried he’d be caught before he could carry out a suicide attack, according to a journal recovered after his arrest and contained in a federal complaint Tuesday.
Investigators took Rahami into custody Monday after he was shot multiple times earlier in the day during a running gunfight with police officers in Linden, New Jersey. 
Federal prosecutors charged Rahami on Tuesday with use of weapons of mass destruction, bombing a place of public use, destruction of property by means of explosives, and use of a destructive device during and in furtherance of a crime of violence, according to the complaint filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York in Manhattan.
Rahami faces four counts in connection with the Saturday bombing on West 23rd Street in the Chelsea section of Manhattan and the placement of a second explosive device a few blocks north on West 27th Street, according to the complaint. 
A separate federal complaint, filed Tuesday in New Jersey, charged Rahami with six counts — including two more for use of a weapon of mass destruction — related to the Saturday morning bombing in Seaside Park, New Jersey, and the discovery of an explosive-laden package Sunday night near the Elizabeth, New Jersey, train station.
If convicted, Rahami could spend the rest of his life in prison. Union County, New Jersey, prosecutors charged him Monday with attempted murder of a police officer and unlawful possession of a weapon. His bail was set at $5.2 million.
The court filings provided a trove of new details about Rahami’s background and possible motivations for the Chelsea bombing — so far elusive to investigators. The New York complaint revealed that a family member took a cellphone video of Rahami igniting an incendiary object at his Elizabeth home just two days before the Saturday bombings.
The blast concussion from the Chelsea blast blew the windows out of buildings nearly 500 feet away and at least three stories high inside the 600-foot crime scene, according to the complaint.
And it was not enough to pack gunpowder and other material into an explosive device. The bomb that detonated on 23rd Street was packed with ballbearings and steel nuts for a maxium lethal outcome, according to the complaint.
The court filings also again underscored the similarities between Rahami’s alleged actions and those of the Boston Marathon bombers in 2013. Like the Boston plotters, Rahami crafted crudely made pressure-cooker bombs.
The Chelsea explosions wounded 29, ratcheted up fears among already on-edge New Yorkers and added another security concern for the NYPD, days before the annual meeting of the United Nations General Assembly in Manhattan. An explosion in Seaside Park, New Jersey, on Saturday, also the work of Rahami, authorities said, forced the cancellation of a running race, but there were no injuries. 
Also Tuesday, the FBI revealed that Rahami’s father told agents two years ago that he suspected his son was a terrorist, but an investigation determined the 28-year-old had no ties to terrorism.
Authorities said Rahami, who remains hospitalized, has not cooperated with investigators. And despite the references to jihad and global terrorism written in his journal, investigators said they have yet to find anything linking Rahami to terrorist groups abroad or any domestic cells.
Another similarity to the events surrounding the Boston bombing emerged Tuesday. Like the Tsarnaev brothers, who carried out the marathon bombings, federal officials had previously known of Rahami.
An FBI spokeswoman said in a statement that the agency “initiated an assessment” of Rahami in August 2014 “based upon comments made by his father after a domestic dispute that were subsequently reported to authorities.”
But the FBI’s probe, based on “internal database reviews, interagency checks, and multiple interviews,” did not reveal any “ties to terrorism,” New York-based FBI spokeswoman Kelly Langmesser said. 
Sources said Rahami’s father, Mohammad Rahami, complained his son was a terrorist to local police, who eventually passed remarks on to a Newark-based FBI joint terrorism task force.
Rep. Peter King (R-Seaford) questioned why the FBI failed to follow up on warning signs about Rahami just like before the Boston Marathon in 2013 and before Omar Matteen killed scores in June inside an Orlando nightclub.
“I just find there is a pattern here,” King said in a telephone interview. “I was aware that Homeland Security referred him to the FBI” after Ahmad Khan Rahami made trips to Afghanistan, something that is “pretty much standard procedure.”
King, chairman of the House subcommittee on counterterrorism, said “the FBI didn’t find anything. This seems somewhat similar to Orlando and Boston.”
Rahami’s father eventually retracted the claim against his son, saying he had been upset at Ahmad for stabbing another son, sources said. The father also told authorities he made the call because his son was hanging out with the wrong crowd, including gangs.
The video captured on the cellphone shows Rahami in a backyard with a small, black, cylindrical object buried in the ground, according to the complaint. 
“The fuse is lit and the object ignites,” the complaint stated. “The Video depicts the lighting of the fuse, a loud noise and flames, followed by billowing smoke and laughter. Rahami then enters the frame and is seen picking up the cylindrical container.”
The journal, the complaint stated, included laudatory references to Anwar al-Awlaki, an American-born cleric said to be a senior al-Qaida planner at the time of his death in 2011 after a U.S. drone strike. In one entry Rahami says he hoped he wouldn’t get caught before he could carry out a suicide attack.
“The F.B.I. &amp; homeland security [unintelligible] looking for me [unintelligible] my heart I pray I beg [unintelligible] for shahadat &amp; Inshallah ,” according to the entry.
In the affidavit, FBI agent Peter Licata said Rahami planted two different bombs made of pressure cookers filled with shrapnel and using cellphones as fuses on 23rd and 27th streets in Manhattan Saturday. 
The affidavit also said Rahami planted a bomb that exploded in a trash container at the start of the charity race in Seaside Park, and left five other bombs that didn’t detonate at a location near the Elizabeth train station.
Licata said 12 of Rahami’s fingerprints were found on the 27th Street bomb and he was caught on surveillance video. Agents were able to trace his purchases of bomb components on the internet — including citric acid, a precursor used in explosives, a circuit board, igniters and lead balls used as shrapnel, according to the complaint.

NYBLAS0921

Feds: Chelsea bombing suspect wrote of jihad, suicide attacks 

Feds: Bomb suspect wrote of suicide attacks

Ahmad Khan Rahami's father talks outside family home

Newsday

Suspected Chelsea bomber Ahmad Khan Rahami is a naturalized U.S. citizen whose family operates a popular Elizabeth, New Jersey, fast-food eatery known to feed patrons who could not afford to pay, officials and witnesses said Monday.
Rahami, 28, was born in Afghanistan in 1988 and came to the United States in 2000, the FBI said. In an interview Monday night, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo told CNN that investigators said Rahami has a wife in Pakistan. 
U.S. Rep. Albio Sires (D-New Jersey) said Rahami emailed his office from Pakistan in 2014 seeking help because his pregnant wife had an expired Pakistani passport, the Associated Press reported.
Sires said his office wrote a letter to the U.S. embassy in Pakistan to check on the status of the case and that the woman eventually received a visa, according to AP. The congressman said he didn’t know if she ever came to the United States, and the FBI didn’t answer when asked Monday, AP said.
According to various news reports, Rahami in 2007 graduated from Edison High School in Edison, New Jersey. An Edison Township School District official declined to comment Monday when asked whether Rahami had graduated from the district.
Edison Class of 2007 graduate Chris Konya, a radio host inRochester, posted on Twitter what he said was Rahami’s high school yearbook photo showing a young man with curly hair and a thin mustache and goatee. 
Speaking to a local ABC News affiliate, Konya remembered Rahami as “well-dressed,” “funny” and ‘‘not abrasive.’’ He recalled Rahami moving to Afghanistan after graduating. A family acquaintance also told Reuters that Rahami had traveled to Afghanistan in recent years.
“The timespan of going from blending in to being the most wanted man in America in less than 10 years — that’s the most shocking for me,” Konya said of his former classmate.
Rahami recently lived in Elizabeth and had worked in his father’s business, First American Fried Chicken, on Elmora Avenue, a few miles from Newark Liberty Airport, officials and customers said. FBI investigators early Monday swarmed an apartment kept by the Muslim family above the restaurant.
“He’s a very friendly guy, that’s what’s so scary,” said customer Ryan McCann of Elizabeth.
It was a popular neighborhood eatery, customers said. The restaurant was known to stay open until 2 a.m. 
“There’s always elementary school, high school kids in there,” said Giovanni Morales, 21, a Union Community College student who lives near the restaurant.
Some neighbors had complained to Elizabeth officials that the restaurant was a late-night nuisance, residents said. When the city passed an ordinance requiring it to close early, Rahami’s father, Mohammad Rahami, and two brothers sued the city, Elizabeth Mayor J. Christian Bollwage said. The suit was terminated in 2012.
Marcella Perrotti, owner of the barbershop Short Cutz, which has been open up the block from the Khans’ restaurant for 16 years, called the family “standoffish.”
“All the shop owners would talk together, but we didn’t really know them,” Perrotti, 44, said. “I was shocked to hear that this was happening right under our noses.” 
Jonathan Wagner, who grew up around the corner from the restaurant and said he went to college with one of Ahmad Khan Rahami’s brothers, called the Rahamis “generally nice people.” 
“If I couldn’t pay for my food, his dad would say, ‘It’s OK’ and let me take it,” said Wagner, 26, a server at a Linden diner.

NYPROF0920

Suspected Chelsea bomber recalled as ‘funny’ in high school

Bombing suspect recalled as ‘funny’ student

NYPROF0920_WEB

Ahmad Khan Rahami, the suspect in the Chelsea bombing that injured 29 people on Saturday, Sept. 17, 2016,&nbsp;was captured Monday, authorities said. Here is what we know about the suspect so far: 
<ul> 
 <li>Rahami, 28, is a naturalized U.S. citizen from Afghanistan.</li> 
 <li>His father owned&nbsp;the First American Fried Chicken restaurant in&nbsp;Elizabeth, New Jersey.</li> 
 <li>Rahami’s father and two brothers sued Elizabeth, claiming that police and city officials improperly tried to restrict the restaurant’s hours,&nbsp;Elizabeth Mayor J. Christian Bollwage said. The family said citations were issued against them spawned by complaints filed by residents who made anti-Muslim comments to them. The lawsuit was terminated in 2012 after Rahami’s brother pleaded guilty to blocking police from enforcing the restriction.</li> 
 <li>Five&nbsp;of his family members were taken into custody for questioning and released Monday. No one was arrested. “They gave very significant information to the FBI,” Rep. Peter King (R-Seaford) said.</li> 
 <li>In addition to information from Rahami’s family, video of Rahami at the scene in Chelsea and evidence from an unexploded pressure cooker that was found nearby led to Rahami’s arrest, King said.</li> 
 <li>Police captured Rahami on Monday in Linden, New Jersey, after&nbsp;a shootout, authorities said. Rahami pulled a gun and shot an officer before other officers joined in and brought Rahami down, wounding him in the process, police said. Two officers were wounded.</li> 
 <li>Rahami is also wanted&nbsp;in the Seaside Park, New Jersey, bombing on Saturday morning, officials said. No one was injured.</li> 
 <li>There’s no evidence connecting the suspect in the Chelsea bombing to a terror cell, according to the FBI. “I have no indication that there is a cell operating here,” FBI Special Agent William Sweeney said.</li> 
</ul>

Ahmad Khan Rahami: 8 things we know so far about the bombings suspect

8 things we know about the bombings suspect

Ahmad Khan Rahami -- cropped/mk

Robert E. Kessler

A U.S. citizen born in Afghanistan and accused in Saturday’s Chelsea bombing was captured Monday in New Jersey after a running gun battle on rain-slicked streets that ended with him and the police officer who first confronted him shot and wounded, authorities said.
Investigators have so far found no solid links between the suspect, Ahmad Khan Rahami, 28, of Elizabeth, New Jersey, and international terrorism or any domestic terror cells but were searching through his activity in social media looking for possible co-conspirators.
FBI Special Agent William Sweeney said after the suspect’s capture that investigators are now trying to “completely understand Rahami’s social networks.”
Sources briefed on the investigation said Monday that Rahami traveled back and forth between Afghanistan and the United States in the past few years. The sources also said they have information indicating that he may have crossed into Pakistan from Afghanistan but it was unknown whether he had any military training while in either country.
Investigators also continued pursuing whether additional explosive devices remain unaccounted for and whether others knew of the suspect’s bomb making or radicalization and didn’t report it, said Rep. Peter King (R-Seaford).
King, who has talked with FBI and NYPD officials with knowledge of the investigation, said Christmas lights were used as detonators on a second, unexploded bomb in Manhattan, as well as the detonated device in Seaside Park, New Jersey, earlier Saturday.
The bomb that malfunctioned Saturday, blocks north of where the first bomb went off in the Chelsea section of Manhattan, allowed investigators to recover a fingerprint and a mobile phone that they traced to Rahami, King said.
“The main connection was the bombs themselves,” said King, chairman of the House counterterrorism subcommittee. “The bombs were very similar.”
In an interview Monday night, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo told CNN that only Rahami’s fingerprints and DNA were found amid the explosives. 
“The operating theory is that he was operating on his own,” Cuomo said.
Prosecutors in Union County, New Jersey, charged Rahami, who most recently worked at his family’s Elizabeth fried chicken restaurant, with multiple counts of attempted murder of a police officer and unlawful possession of a weapon. His bail was set at $5.2 million, and he is scheduled for his first court appearance Sept. 28, prosecutors said.
Hours earlier, a Linden, New Jersey police officer approached Rahami in the doorway outside a bar and restaurant after responding to a call about a vagrant. When confronted, Rahami opened fire, police said, hitting the wounded officer in the bulletproof vest and engaging in a running gunfight with pursuing officers before getting shot multiple times.
His capture ended a rapid-fire manhunt that gained speed and urgency by the hour after the bomb he is suspected of planting in Chelsea exploded Saturday night, injuring 29 people and giving New Yorkers another unwelcome reminder of the city’s ever-present status as the prime terrorism target in the United States. 
Investigators also suspect that Rahami placed a package laden with explosives in a trash can discovered Sunday night near an Elizabeth train station. That device exploded early Monday as a police bomb squad robot attempted to disarm it. It was one of five such devices found near the train station, authorities said.
President Barack Obama, visiting New York City for the gathering of the United Nations General Assembly in Manhattan, praised the “tough” and “resilient” response of the people of New York and New Jersey and offered them up as an example of how Americans should respond.
“Folks around here, they don’t get scared,” Obama said. “They go about their business every single day. That’s the kind of strength that makes me so proud to be an American.”
Investigators had a strong indicator of who the prime suspect was just a day after the bombings because surveillance video captured images of the same man at the 23rd Street location in Chelsea and the area on West 27th Street where State Police found the unexploded device.
The hunt picked up speed late Sunday night after FBI agents and investigators with the NYPD stopped a “vehicle of interest” on the Belt Parkway in Brooklyn in connection with the Chelsea bombing. 
Investigators took five people into custody for questioning at an FBI facility in lower Manhattan and released them Monday without charges filed, officials said. The five were members of Rahami’s family, King said.
“They were family members who left the house last night,” King said. “They gave very significant information to the FBI.”
Sunday night, people in the metro area went to bed as news broke about the Brooklyn traffic stop. They awoke Monday morning to learn that the bomb near the Elizabeth train station had exploded at about 12:30 a.m.
A Linden police officer came upon Rahami 10 hours later in the doorway outside Merdie’s, a bar and restaurant, after responding to a call about a vagrant sleeping there, said Linden Police Capt. James Sarnicki.
Rahami shot and wounded an officer and was shot himself after a chase, Sarnicki said, adding that the suspect was shot in a leg and arm.
Rahami, who had been turned over to FBI custody, underwent surgery, officials said, but his condition was not known Monday night.
The link that authorities said identified him as the possible bomber was partly a byproduct of his own handiwork.
Three of the bombs had one component in common: a flip-style cellphone, a federal official said, adding that the pipe bomb that exploded in Seaside Park was constructed with a threaded pipe and black powder. The official said the two devices found in New York City included pressure cookers, similar to the devices used in the 2013 attack at the Boston Marathon that killed three and wounded hundreds more.
Despite collecting what they have said is DNA and fingerprints of Rahami from the exploded bomb fragments, the physical evidence is just a piece of the wider investigation. Federal and local law enforcement still are searching for a motive. They are hoping the justification for the bombings can be found poring over Rahami’s various associations, investigators said.
Among the many unanswered questions, King said: Was Rahami on the terrorist watch list? Was the Chelsea bombing a decoy for an attack on the United Nations General Assembly meetings? Also, King said, what possible affiliations could the suspect have in Afghanistan, where the Islamic State group does not have a strong presence? 
Cuomo told CNN Rahami’s wife lives in Pakistan.
Meanwhile, just two days after the bombings, Manhattan residents and those with business in the city tried to take the advice of Cuomo, Mayor Bill de Blasio and others to move on with their lives as investigators continue their efforts. Easier said than done, said Jose “Danny” Collador, 51, of New Jersey as he dined inside the Malibu diner, just two doors down from where the Chelsea device blew up in a garbage bin.
“I am happy but I hope business will get better. It’s not easy when you have to close your business,” he said.
Shalev Katzav, 32, owner of the “Wrapido,” a falafel stand, said, the weekend’s terror explosion “can happen anywhere.” 
Katzav said he came to New York from northern Israel to get away “from the war and fighting.” His experience with terror in the Middle East is emotionally draining, Katzav said, and the weekend bombing “brought back those feelings.”

NYBLAS0920

Chelsea bombing: Ahmad Khan Rahami in custody, official says

Official: Suspect charged with attempted murder

Comp/mk

ESTERO, FLA. — Donald Trump roused thousands at a rally Monday in this Gulf Coast town with a promise to beef up border security to stem the threat of terror to the United States.
His vow took on new light in the wake of attacks in New York, New Jersey and Minnesota.
“Immigration security is national security,” the Republican presidential nominee said to roars of approval at Germain Arena near Fort Myers, Florida. “My opponent has the most open borders policy of anyone to seek the presidency.”
Trump applauded law enforcement officials for the arrest of the suspect behind Saturday’s bomb in Chelsea that injured 29.
“Today, we have caught this evil thug who planted the bombs,” the real estate mogul said before lamenting that Ahmad Khan Rahami would likely receive quality medical care and legal representation.
Trump ticked off recent instances of terrorism in San Bernadino, California, Orlando, and Paris and Nice in France. 
“We cannot let this evil continue,” he said of “radical Islamic terrorism,” though he did not reference his platform to temporarily ban Muslims from the country.
He called for “extreme screening” of those coming to the United States, saying people admitted into the country must love the country.
He blamed Hillary Clinton, the Democratic presidential nominee and former secretary of state, and President Barack Obama for policies that he said led to the spread of the Islamic State group.
Trump vowed to win Florida, a diverse battleground state that he was visiting for the second time in four days.
A Siena College Research poll released Monday showed Clinton with 41 percent support compared to Trump with 40 percent in a hypothetical four-way race in the Sunshine State with third-party candidates Gary Johnson and Jill Stein. 
Clinton appears to be struggling to overcome Trump despite outspending him here on ads and campaign offices. She was to discuss the economy at an event Wednesday in Orlando.
Trump and Clinton — who spoke to millennials in Philadelphia on Monday — were on the stump in swing states with their first debate at Hofstra University one week away and Election Day just seven weeks away.
Trump supporters filled the Germain Arena’s 7,000-plus seats, and thousands packed the floor of the facility typically used for hockey games. Crowds were turned away at the door for lack of space.
Many wore shirts that played off Clinton’s comment that half of her rival’s supporters can be placed into a “basket of deplorables,” flipping the insult into a badge of honor.
“I’m one of Trump’s adorable deplorables,” two women’s shirts read. 
“Deplorable lives matter,” another woman’s shirt read.
State Rep. Dane Eagle (R-Cape Coral), a warm-up speaker, greeted Trump fans as “my fellow deplorables.”
Former Copiague resident and retired NYPD detective Larry Schwartz, 70, waited more than three hours in the sweltering humidity to see Trump.
“I’m here because I can’t vote for Hillary. I won’t vote for Hillary,” said Schwartz, who now lives in Stonybrook, Florida. “All the lying, she doesn’t tell the truth.”
Schwartz, who said he was formerly a Democrat, said he was drawn to Trump as the law-and-order candidate. 
“Blue lives matter,” he said, adding that Trump was a refreshing type of candidate: “It’s time to give someone a chance who doesn’t have political experience.”

Nation/World

USTRUM0920

Donald Trump in Fla.: ‘Immigration security is national security’

Trump promises to beef up border security

Video

Trump campaigns near Fort Myers, Florida

First American Fried Chicken, the restaurant that the family of bombing suspect Ahmad Kahn Rahami owned and operated in Elizabeth, New Jersey, was the target of long-running complaints by neighbors and a feud with city officials over its late hours of operation.
But the family, Muslims originally from Afghanistan, claimed in a lawsuit against the city and its police department that they were the victim of religious and ethnic discrimination. 
Elizabeth Mayor J. Christian Bollwage told reporters Monday the fried chicken restaurant, a 24-hour operation when it first opened in 2002, often stayed open past midnight and that noisy, late-night patrons created a nuisance.
“It was neighbor complaints, it had nothing to do with his ethnicity or religion,” Bollwage said, referring to a 2011 federal discrimination lawsuit also filed by relatives, including Rahami’s father Mohammad R. Rahami against the city. “It had to do with noise and people congregating on the streets.”
Bollwage said the family lived in an apartment above the dine-in or take-out restaurant on Elmora Avenue a few miles from Newark Liberty Airport. 
“It was an ongoing problem through the years,” the mayor said, and was mostly on the weekends “when they thought there would be more business.”
The lawsuit offered a completely different take on the dispute, saying from 2008 through 2011 the family was subjected to citations and summonses even though they had a legal right to stay open past 10 p.m.
It said other nearby businesses, including a Dunkin’ Donuts, White Castle and Carvel stayed open past 10 p.m. “without incident, complaint, or being the subject of a summons by the police.”
The suit alleged that one resident, James Dean McDermott, “persisted in a course of conduct designed to intimidate and harass plaintiffs by reason of their religion and national identity and national origin.”
It said McDermott, who often complained to police about the business, commented to the family that “you are Muslims” and that “Muslims make too much trouble in this country.”
McDermott on Monday denied he made anti-Muslim comments to the family, and said he was only concerned about the late-night hours and disruptions to the neighborhood, including from drunks who frequented the chicken business.
“People from the chicken shop were always out here, urinating on my driveway,” he said, adding it was frequent enough “to make me mad about people urinating on my driveway. I don’t know what your tolerance is for that.”
McDermott said he hadn’t spoken to Rahami’s father since around 2011.
The lawsuit also stated police officers told the family “there’s too much crime around here,” and that “this area by your restaurant is a known place for criminal activity” — even though there was no validity to the claims.
On June 15, 2009, two family members were arrested after officers arrived to issue another summons, the lawsuit states. One was not charged and was released after several hours, but the other was charged with disorderly conduct and preventing police from lawfully performing an official function.
The outcome of the charges was unclear Monday.
The lawsuit said that from 2002 to 2008 the restaurant operated without problem, though the mayor said that at some point neighbors started complaining about the people and noise.
By 2009, the City Council passed an ordinance to make the restaurant close by 10 p.m. The family did not always comply.
The lawsuit was ruled in the city’s favor in 2012, the mayor said, giving the city the right to close the business at 10 p.m.
Police often had to show up and tell them a city ordinance requires them to close at 10, “at which time when the police came they would close,” Bollwage said.
The mayor repeatedly denied the city’s actions were due to the family’s religion or ethnic background.
He said he did not think the attacks over the weekend had anything to do with the lawsuit or the feud with the city. “I’m not saying that this had anything to do with the vitriol that happened over the weekend,” he said.

NYREST0920

Bombing suspect’s family fought with city over noise complaints

Rahami family, city feuded over restaurant noise

IMGCDLY_WEB

Laura Figueroa Hernandez

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump on Monday called for the use of racial “profiling” to capture suspected terrorists, while Democratic opponent Hillary Clinton denounced his response to Saturday’s explosions in New York and New Jersey as “reckless rhetoric” that was fueling the Islamic State terrorist group.
The presidential hopefuls offered competing counterterrorism visions in the wake of Saturday’s bombings in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan, and in Seaside Park, New Jersey — Clinton, the former secretary of state, billed herself as experienced on national security issues and Trump portrayed himself as eager to “knock the hell out of” terrorists.
During a Monday morning interview on the “Fox and Friends” morning talk show, Trump criticized the nation’s counterterrorism efforts under the Obama administration as weak and “gentle,” and suggested law enforcement agencies should be allowed to racially profile individuals. 
“We don’t wanna do any profiling,” Trump said. “If somebody looks like he’s got a massive bomb on his back, we won’t go up to that person . . . because if he looks like he comes from that part of the world, we’re not allowed to profile. Give me a break.”
Clinton, at a news conference in White Plains, sought to cast Trump as “irresponsible,” and not capable of making complicated national security decisions. She said his rhetoric “has been seized on by terrorists, including ISIS, because they are looking to make this a war against Islam.”
“I am the only candidate in this race who has been part of the hard decisions to take terrorists off the battlefield,” Clinton said touting her experience leading the state department.
Both candidates spoke hours before Ahmad Khan Rahami, 28, a naturalized U.S. citizen born in Afghanistan, was taken into police custody for questioning in the pair of bombings.

USPOLS0920

Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton spar over response to bombings

Trump, Clinton spar over response to bombings

Clinton and Trump comp -- cropped

New Yorkers throughout the city were alerted Monday morning to the name of the Chelsea bombing suspect when the city activated its emergency alert system, the first time it has done so for a wanted suspect. 
The system, which utilizes cellphone towers to disseminate the message, blasted out Ahmad Khan Rahami’s name and age at 7:54 a.m., asking people to call 911 if they saw him. Rahami was captured less than three hours later in Linden, New Jersey.
The Office of Emergency Management said this was only the eighth alert the city sent in the system’s history.
“We think it’s a very valuable tool. We think it created a lot of focus and urgency,” said Mayor Bill de Blasio, speaking at a news conference at police headquarters on Monday. “This is a tool we will use again in the future in similar situations. There obviously was an imminent threat and it was a very appropriate situation in which to use it.”
While the system, part of the Federal Wireless Emergency Alert system, is only sent to people in the five boroughs, some as far as New Jersey reported receiving it, said Ben Krakauer, the director of the Watch Command with the OEM. The system also had been activated for superstorm Sandy and on early Sunday to warn people on 27th Street, where a secondary device was found, to stay away from their windows. 
“It’s going to be on a case-by-case basis. I don’t see us using this for every burglary suspect or robbery suspect,” Krakauer said. “But in cases where there’s a clear need for immediate action by the public, I think we would do it again.”
Krakauer said the system can only send out 90 characters at a time — less than a tweet. It also can’t send a photo and had to direct New Yorkers to media outlets for Rahami’s picture. 
The alert system is regulated by the Federal Communications Commission and can also includes bulletins from the National Weather Service and Amber Alerts.
Police Commissioner James O’Neill said “a lot of good old-fashioned police work” went into capturing Rahami but added that the new technology is helpful.
“It gets everybody involved. It’s that sense of shared responsibility,” O’Neill said. “There’s 36,000 of us, a number of FBI agents, but if we can get everybody in the city engaged in helping keep it safe, I think this is the way to go.”

NYPHON0920

New York City IDs bomb suspect Rahami on emergency alert system

City IDs Rahami  on  emergency alert system

NYPHON0920_WEB

The FBI said agents and investigators with the NYPD stopped a “vehicle of interest” Sunday night in Brooklyn in connection with the Chelsea bombing.
Government and law enforcement officials briefed on the investigation said five people in the vehicle were being questioned at an FBI building in lower Manhattan, The Associated Press reported.
The two officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk about an ongoing investigation.
Also, NBC News reported that a suspicious device found near a northern New Jersey train station Sunday night exploded as a bomb squad robot cut into it. It was unknown if the device was connected to the Chelsea bombing.
FBI officials said no one has been charged with a crime in connection with the 8:45 p.m. Brooklyn traffic stop, but the investigation was continuing. No further details were available.
A state senator said the FBI took five people into custody after the stop.
Sen. Marty Golden (R-Brooklyn) posted a statement on social media shortly after 10 p.m. announcing the apprehension of people with “a possible connection” to the Saturday night bombing along West 23rd Street that injured 29.
“About an hour ago, the FBI took several individuals into custody on the Belt Parkway in the area underneath the Verrazano Bridge, with a possible connection to the bombing last night in Chelsea,” Golden wrote in a post shortly after 10 p.m. on Sunday.
Golden labeled the post as an “update from the NYPD,” but a department spokesman said Sunday night that it had not issued any update and directed all questions to the FBI.
Golden could not immediately be reached late Sunday night.
AP reported early Monday that investigators were examining a suspicious package found in a trash can near a New Jersey train station, and service on the busy Northeast Corridor line had been suspended.
Elizabeth Mayor Christian Bollwage said two men called police and reported seeing wires and a pipe coming out of the package after finding it at about 9:30 p.m. Sunday.
Bollwage said the Union County bomb squad’s robot indicated the package the men left under a train trestle could be a live bomb.
Sometime later Bollwage said, the robot was “cutting into the device when it exploded,” according to NBC News. It was unknown if there were any injuries.
Service on New Jersey Transit was suspended between Newark Liberty Airport and Elizabeth, the AP reported, and New York’s emergency management department said New Jersey-bound Amtrak trains were being held at New York Penn Station.
A message left by the AP with the FBI wasn’t immediately returned.
The developments came nearly 24 hours after dozens were injured after an explosive device rocked a Chelsea neighborhood. Another possible explosive, a pressure cooker with wiring, was also discovered nearby and removed for analysis.
Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo said at a Sunday news conference that it was too early to say whether the explosion, as well as the discovery of what appeared to be a pressure cooker with a cellphone attached a few blocks away, could be linked to international terrorism, but added “a bomb exploding in New York is obviously an act of terrorism.”

NYBRID0919

FBI: ‘Vehicle of interest’ stopped in  Chelsea bombing

NYBRID0919_WEB

Buildings shook and glass shattered as a bomb spewed shrapnel in the Chelsea section of Manhattan on Saturday night. First responders and strangers rushed in to help dozens of injured bystanders, and soon, an unexploded device was found a few blocks north. 
Across the country at a Minnesota mall the same night, a man stabbed nine people before he was shot to death. In New Jersey earlier in the day, a pipe bomb exploded during a charity running race, but resulted in no injuries. 
The incidents underscored a sense of vulnerability that New Yorkers are familiar with: Such violence could happen anywhere at any time. 
The city coped quickly. Twenty-nine people who suffered injuries on 23rd Street were treated on the scene or at hospitals. All were soon released.
Setting a tone of measured preparedness, Mayor Bill de Blasio and new Police Commissioner James O’Neill urged the public to cooperate with law enforcement. O’Neill noted the department’s work in foiling 20 plots against New York City since 9/11.
Whether or not all 20 of those plots were true threats to the city, the NYPD is well-suited to thwart organizations plotting large-scale attacks. But there seems to be little law enforcement can do to stop smaller attacks and less organized actors, no matter what grievance inspires their violence. That was true in the bombing at the Boston Marathon in 2013, and when a car bomb failed to detonate in Times Square in May 2010.
Saturday’s bombing could have been far worse. Defending against similar attacks, be they terrorism foreign or domestic, is very difficult. New Yorkers must help police with tips and cooperation. 
New York City is the world’s prime terrorist target, so even the suburbs are not safe, as we saw with the Saturday morning bombing in Seaside Park, New Jersey. Regional and interagency cooperation are critical to keeping us safe.
Once again, officials asked New Yorkers to be vigilant. They will be, as they have been before. That cooperation is essential and must continue. — The editorial board

VPLIBOMB0919

After NYC bombing, vigilance is key to safety

Editorial: After NYC bombing, vigilance is key to safety

NYHOOD0919_WEB

Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo and New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio on Sunday together toured the Chelsea neighborhood rocked by an explosion, but the two leaders described the blast that injured dozens of people differently.
Cuomo at a Sunday morning news conference said the event was an act of “terrorism.” De Blasio, at a separate news conference about an hour later, called the Saturday night explosion along West 23rd Street an “intentional” bombing, but stopped short of calling it a terrorist act when asked by reporters.
“We know there was a bombing,” de Blasio said. “That much we do know. We know it was a very serious incident, but we have a lot more work to do to be able to say what kind of motivation was behind this. Was it a political motivation, a personal motivation?”
NYPD Commissioner James O’Neill repeated de Blasio’s description, telling reporters: “If there is an act of terrorism, we are going to come out and say it.”
Cuomo told reporters that while it was too soon to determine if the incident was tied to an international terrorist group, “a bomb exploding in New York is obviously an act of terrorism.”
In an interview on MSNBC later Sunday, Cuomo said the different wording used by him and de Blasio was nothing more than “a question of semantics.”
“The mayor and I are in total agreement on the facts and circumstances and the observations. I think it becomes a question of semantics, if anything,” Cuomo said. “Yes, it was an intentional act. It was a violent act. It was a criminal act. And it was an act that frightened, hurt and scared many, many people. And generically, you call that terrorism.”
Cuomo administration officials on Sunday said the governor’s staff and mayor’s office have been working together to coordinate response efforts. 
“We’ve been working very closely together on the staff level,” de Blasio spokesman Eric F. Phillips said in an email to Newsday. “The mayor and governor are absolutely in sync on incident response and ongoing security issues in the City.”

LIWORD0919

Cuomo, de Blasio and the ‘semantics’ of saying ‘terrorism’

Cuomo, de Blasio differ on terror ‘semantics’

LIWORD0919_WEB

Residents of the Chelsea neighborhood where a bomb detonated Saturday night kept it in the back of their minds Sunday, saying they weren’t going to let the explosion alter their lives.
The street where a homemade bomb exploded in a construction trash container remained shut down from 5th Avenue to 8th Avenue as investigators sorted through debris littering the ground.
“It’s very eerie to see 23rd Street blocked,” said Grant Anderson, 55, who lives two blocks from the blast. “If you really think about it, it’s really scary. As a New Yorker, you put up a wall to block that.” 
Gina De Mendonca, 36, and her two children, like other residents of 23rd Street, were escorted back into their home early Sunday afternoon.
“This is to be expected when you live in the big city in these times,” she said, calling the episode “a little crazy” but praising the quick emergency response. 
Tyschelle Doucette, 40, lives in Jamaica, Queens, but attends church in Chelsea. On Sunday, she wouldn’t let an explosion deter her.
“I’m not scared. I was here for 9/11,” said Doucette, a lawyer. “I’m like if it happens, it happens. We’ll all make it out, we always did in the past.”
Doucette spoke to New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio on Sunday as he and Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo visited a Starbucks on Seventh Avenue. He assured her there was nothing to fear. 
Brenden O’Reilly, a bartender at Jake’s Saloon on 23rd Street, said nothing seemed out of the ordinary inside the dark bar on Sunday. 
“Today for business has been much the same as it normally is,” said O’Reilly, 32, who lives in Sunnyside, Queens. “It’s awful, it’s horrifying. You just need to be more alert. I don’t think people should be too afraid. It’s a very secure city. It’s very safe.” 
The Juice Shop, a juice and smoothie bar on Sixth Avenue, offered a 10 percent discount to NYPD and FDNY members. Cindy Martinez, 19, handed out samples to workers in the area.
“I don’t know how to feel about it. I don’t know whether to be paranoid,” said Martinez, who lives in the Port Morris area of the Bronx. While she’s a little unsettled about Saturday’s explosion, Martinez said she isn’t worried enough to alter her life. “I think we do a pretty good job with safety. I don’t think there’s much to be afraid of,” she said.
But others weren’t so quick to dismiss the fear.
Alina Petrychenko, 21, said her parents, who live in Ukraine, were calling her all night. 
“It’s scary, it can happen everywhere all around the world,” said Petrychenko, who works as a server at Bite, a Middle Eastern restaurant on 22nd Street. “I wish I could say it was a gas leak or something. I wish.”
Esti Aquino lives a few blocks from the explosion scene and said she felt the blast in her apartment, comparing it with an earthquake that shook the floor. 
“I feel terrible it happens in New York,” she said, adding while she’s “absolutely scared,” she can’t let it change her daily life. 
“We should not let this intimidate us,” she said. “We should stay united. It is difficult to avoid this.”
<h4>Bazona Bado </h4>

NYHOOD0919

Chelsea explosion leaves many New Yorkers undeterred 1 day later

NYers get back to normal day after explosion

Gov. Cuomo visits Penn Station

Investigators are reviewing a surveillance video showing a person around the device that detonated Saturday and sent shrapnel flying into a Chelsea neighborhood.
Sources familiar with the investigation said Sunday that police will be using facial recognition software and other technology to help assess the image on the video.
“What this guy’s role is is not crystal clear,” one of the sources said.
The bombing led Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo to send 1,000 National Guard and State Police officers to increase patrols in the city. NYPD officers, already on alert for this week’s meeting of the United Nations General Assembly, also are increasing patrols, officials said.
Cuomo said at a Sunday news conference it’s too early to say whether the explosion, as well as the discovery of what appears to be a pressure cooker with a cellphone attached a few blocks away, could be linked to international terrorism, but “a bomb exploding in New York is obviously an act of terrorism.”
The bomb detonated about 8:30 p.m. Saturday in or near a trash bin at 131 W. 23rd St., officials said. No person or group has claimed responsibility.
Mayor Bill de Blasio said at a Sunday news conference that police have been examining the second device, which was discovered and removed before it could explode, to determine if the two are linked. The second device found on 27th Street was similar to homemade bombs that exploded at the Boston Marathon in 2013, killing three people and injuring more than 260.
Sources close to the investigation said the Chelsea bomb also is being studied for any link to another that exploded Saturday morning in Seaside Park, New Jersey, based on the similarity of the detonators used and that the explosives were not complex.
“It’s going to take a lot of serious investigation to get to the facts and the truth,” de Blasio said.
Nassau County Executive Edward Mangano and acting Police Commissioner Thomas Krumpter said in a statement that although there are no known imminent threats to Nassau, “police are monitoring these attacks along with federal, state, and local authorities.”
Suffolk Police Commissioner Timothy Sini said his department is in contact with the NYPD and FBI and that officials are monitoring the situation.
All of the 29 people injured in the explosion have been released from hospitals, officials said.
“As of this time, the exact cause of this explosion has not been determined,” NYPD Commissioner James O’Neill said in a statement Sunday night. “Investigation into this incident is active at this time and an extensive search is being conducted. The area around the explosion site is being treated as a crime scene.”
De Blasio, who toured the scene of the explosion with Cuomo Sunday, said he was reluctant to call the bombing — which is being investigated by the NYPD’s anti-terror unit, the FBI and the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives — an act of terror.
“Here’s what we know: It was intentional. It was a violent act. It certainly was a criminal act. It was a bombing,” the mayor said. “To understand any specific motivations, clinical motivations, any connection to an organization, that’s what we don’t know. I think it’s important to say what we know.”
Sources said authorities were going to the different hospitals where victims were taken so they could recover bits and pieces of the shrapnel fragments embedded in their bodies for analysis. The remnants of the explosion were taken to the FBI lab in Quantico, Virginia for analysis and the pressure cooker was taken by the bomb squad to the NYPD gun range at Rodman’s Neck, where it was taken apart, sources said. It also will go to the FBI lab for analysis.
Rep. Peter King (R-Seaford), chairman of the House counterterrorism subcommittee, said it was too early to rule out a connection to international terrorism, even though the bomb breaks the mold by being placed in a location that was not a typical target, such as a major corporation or a government building.
King, who also toured the blast site Sunday, said he doesn’t think the explosive was some “small homemade, little device” because the blast broke several windows and “the dumpster was huge and it was blown halfway down the street.”
Ramon Lopez said early Sunday that he was standing on West 23rd Street near Sixth Avenue Saturday night when he heard the explosion. 
Lopez, 48, of East Harlem, said he saw people bleeding, with small pieces of metal fragments stuck in their arms. He described many of the injured as “disoriented” and said he helped guide one bleeding woman to an ambulance as he calmed others. 
“What was going through my mind? That another bomb could explode and we’re all going to be gone. But at that time, when the detectives told me I had to leave, I said, ‘You know what, I’m not scared to die, so I need to be here. I need to help, too.’ ” 
The explosion blew the construction trash container across the busy street of restaurants, bars, hotels and apartments, knocked glass out of windows and sent people running into the street.
Nita Patel, 36, who lives next to where the explosion occurred, said she was in TriBeCa at 8:30 Saturday night when her neighbor called. 
“My neighbor called and said, ‘Did you feel the shake?’ We drove up and parked the car in the garage and then cops said ‘you’re not going back up.’ ”
Patel and her family, including two young children, stayed at a friend’s home on West 22nd Street. They waited Sunday morning to get back into their home.
“It kind of reminds me of Hurricane Sandy,” Patel said, referring to being displaced and scrambling to find somewhere to go.

NYBOMB0919

Chelsea explosion video shows person near device, sources say

Sources: Video shows person near explosive device

Chelsea blast seen from 3 angles on surveillance video

John Asbury

An explosion in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan that injured 29 people on Saturday night was an “intentional act,” but did not appear to be connected to terrorism, Mayor Bill de Blasio said.
Meanwhile, authorities early Sunday were investigating a pressure cooker with a cellphone and wires attached that was found several blocks away, warning nearby residents to stay away from their windows as they determined if it was a dangerous item, law-enforcement sources said.
De Blasio, speaking near the blast site and flanked by NYPD, FDNY and other officials, said injuries from the blast were “significant.” One person was seriously injured and 23 others were taken to hospitals for treatment after the 8:30 p.m. blast at 131 West 23rd St., authorities said.
None of the people injured was likely to die, the mayor said.
FDNY officials said most of the injuries were scrapes and abrasions from glass and metal, but the serious injury was a puncture wound.
The mayor also said the blast, which was still under investigation, did not appear to have a “terror connection.”
Officials said they were backtracking through video taken in the area, including video that captured the blast itself, to determine who placed the device.
James P. O’Neill, on his first full day as NYPD commissioner, said “the exact cause of this explosion has not been determined,” and added that there was “no evidence of a gas explosion.”
De Blasio also said there did not appear to be a connection to a blast earlier in the day in a trash can in Seaside Park, New Jersey.
“There is no specific and credible threat against New York City at this point in time from any terror organization,” he said.
The second site — on West 27th Street between Sixth and Seventh avenues — was being actively investigated as the mayor spoke. Police were telling residents on that street to stay away from windows until the scene was cleared.
In 2013, two pressure-cooker bombs filled with nails and ball bearings exploded at the Boston Marathon, killing six people and injuring 280 others. 
“Whatever the cause, whatever the intentions here, New Yorkers will not be intimidated,” de Blasio said on Saturday.
Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo issued a statement Saturday night saying “full state resources have been made available” to the city, and White House officials said President Barack Obama had been “apprised of the explosion.”
Nassau police said on Saturday night they were on “heightened alert” and had intensified patrols in the county in response to both bombings.
Nearby residents reported hearing the Chelsea explosion, and police cleared sidewalks and streets of pedestrians and cars and pushed people back from the scene, where glass could be seen strewed around the street. 
FDNY officials said they were assessing surrounding structures for damage.
The NYPD counterterrorism unit on Saturday night released a photo of a dumpster twisted and crushed from the blast.
“Please clear the streets. Call it an evening,” an officer announced over a megaphone.
The blast occurred near the Visions at Selis Manor, a home for people with blindness, and the Townhouse Inn of Chelsea. A call to Visions facility was not answered Saturday night, and a man who answered the phone at the Townhouse Inn said he hadn’t been told anything about the investigation.
The ATF explosives task force also responded to the scene — a busy street filled with restaurants, bars and hotels.
Lisa Budihas, 44, from Williston Park, was on her way to visit friends on 27th street when she realized what had happened hours earlier. 
“I’m shocked right now,” she said, sitting on the median dividing Broadway. “For a second I said wait, what if something happens again? We’re in the middle of everything.” 
But she said she doesn’t feel unsafe. Cops, she added “are all around us.” 
Laurie Mechali, 48, was staying at a hotel on 27th Street. Mechali, from California, was in New York visiting with her family, who lives in Paris. 
“We just came back and the street was shut down,” she said. The group had been walking around Times Square. “There’s a lot of police here, we don’t feel unsafe.
“There were attacks in Paris,” she added. “There’s not a place you can be safe.” 
Jenny Vargas, 40, who lives about one block north, and her daughter Kayla, 7, were out to buy a pet fish when her husband, Kelvin, called and told her “there was an explosion.”
“I’m scared,” Kayla told her mother, who held her daughter’s hand as she carried a plastic bag of goldfish home.
Keith Allen, 58, of California, said he was on his way to dinner when he heard “a huge ka-boom. Everyone on the street just stopped and literally looked at each other.” Allen said he smelled sulfur, and within minutes he saw police cars starting to arrive.
Earlier Saturday, a pipe bomb exploded in a Jersey Shore town shortly before thousands of runners were due to participate in a charity 5K race to benefit Marines and sailors, authorities said.
No injuries were reported in the blast in Seaside Park around 9:30 a.m. Saturday, said Al Della Fave, spokesman for the Ocean County prosecutor’s office. He also said no surrounding structures sustained any apparent damage.
The third annual Seaside Semper Five run was canceled, and the immediate area was put on lockdown.
The pipe bomb was in a plastic garbage can when it exploded, Della Fave said. Authorities immediately cleared the boardwalk and beach area, and bomb-sniffing dogs were used to search the area.
Authorities said there was a report of at least one other explosive device that a New Jersey State Police bomb team would “make safe,” but further details were not disclosed.
With AP

NYBLAS0918

De Blasio: Dozens injured in Manhattan explosion

Mayor: NYC blast that hurts dozens was 'intentional act'

NYBLAS0918_VFY_WEB

NYC, N.J. bombings

607521892 / jcm

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