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Speaker 1: Hey, Alphabet Boys listeners, this is Trevor Aronson. I'm here

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Speaker 1: to tell you about a new series from me and

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Speaker 1: Western Sound, Pulse the Untold Story. It's an eight episode

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Speaker 1: investigation of the Pulse night club shooting that will leave

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Speaker 1: you wondering if anything you've heard about this case is true.

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Speaker 1: The series is available exclusively on Audible. In a gay

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Speaker 1: night club in Orlando on June twelfth, twenty sixteen, Omar

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Speaker 1: Matin murdered forty nine people in wounded fifty three others.

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Speaker 1: The attack was the deadliest act of violence against the

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Speaker 1: LGBTQ plus community in US history, and the deadliest terrorist

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Speaker 1: attack in the United States since nine to eleven. But

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Speaker 1: there's a story you haven't heard. The FBI had a

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Speaker 1: secret history with the shooter and his father. To obscure

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Speaker 1: that history, the FBI pushed a false story that the

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Speaker 1: media dutifully carried, that the attacker was a secretly gay

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Speaker 1: Islamist extremist who had chosen to target Pulse and plan

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Speaker 1: the attack for weeks. In Pulse the Untold Story, I

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Speaker 1: uncover the volatile relationship between the shooter and his father

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Speaker 1: and how their troubled interactions with the FBI lead to

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Speaker 1: one disturbing question. Could the FBI have prevented the massacre?

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Speaker 1: You're about to hear the first episode. To listen to

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Speaker 1: all eight episodes, search for Pulse the Untold Story on

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Speaker 1: the Audible app or go to audible dot com slash

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Speaker 1: Pulse the Untold Story. Start listening today when you sign

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Speaker 1: up for a free thirty day trial. Here's episode one.

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Speaker 1: On June twelfth, twenty sixteen, Omar Matine calls nine to

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Speaker 1: one one and speaks with an operator Emerson.

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Speaker 2: I want this is DOCTA. Line's very recorded.

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Speaker 3: Listen.

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Speaker 4: What's that I'm working out of?

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Speaker 2: Stood in there?

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Speaker 4: I want to let you know I'm in Orlando.

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Speaker 5: Then I did the shooting.

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Speaker 2: What's your name?

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Speaker 4: My name is I pledge of allegiance to Adakhadaddy of

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Speaker 4: the Islamic State.

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Speaker 2: Okay, what's your name.

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Speaker 4: I've pledge my allegiance to Abu Baker al Daha. Daddy

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Speaker 4: has to do law on behad of the Islamic State.

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Speaker 2: Where are you at in Orlando?

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Speaker 5: Where?

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Speaker 2: In Orlando?

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Speaker 1: Omar is inside a bathroom at Pulse, a gay nightclub

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Speaker 1: in Orlando, Florida. Just minutes earlier, he'd slaughtered dozens of

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Speaker 1: people with an assault rifle and a handgun.

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Speaker 2: Two forty eight am.

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Speaker 1: Police are now desperately trying to call Omar. There are

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Speaker 1: people trapped inside the bathroom with the shooter. Some are dead,

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Speaker 1: they're blood pooling on the tile floor. Others are alive

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Speaker 1: but wounded. The survivors are motionless, pretending to be dead.

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Speaker 2: Hellas, hello there, Hi, there, this is Orlando police. Who

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Speaker 2: am I speaking with police?

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Speaker 4: You're speaking as the person who toasted allegiance to the

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Speaker 4: Islamic state of the Ember aboudity put.

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Speaker 1: As Omar talks to a hostage negotiator, he reveals his.

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Speaker 2: Motive to do is prevent anybody else the US air strikes.

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Speaker 4: They need to stop the US air strikes.

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Speaker 2: Okay, I understand.

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Speaker 4: You need to stop the US air strikes. You have

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Speaker 4: to tell the US governments to stop bombing. Are killing

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Speaker 4: too many children, are killing too many women, and they

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Speaker 4: stand that. I feel the pain of the people getting

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Speaker 4: killed in Syria.

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Speaker 2: In all over than in the pas. Okay, So so

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Speaker 2: I've just done something about that. Yes, I tell me

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Speaker 2: what you did? Please you already know what I did. Well,

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Speaker 2: I'm trying to.

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Speaker 1: Figure out Omar matein murdered forty nine people and injured

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Speaker 1: fifty three others. His horrific rampage ended with his own death.

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Speaker 1: A police officer shot him in the head three hours

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Speaker 1: after his attack began. You like know about this, You've

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Speaker 1: heard the story. Most people are familiar with the Pulse

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Speaker 1: nightclub shooting. But the story I'm about to tell you

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Speaker 1: here is different because most of what you've heard about

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Speaker 1: Pulse is wrong. I'm Trevor Aronson from Western Sound. This

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Speaker 1: is Pulse, the Untold Story, an audible original episode, One

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Speaker 1: Needle and a Haystack.

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Speaker 6: It was a beautiful nightclub with two sections in it.

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Speaker 6: You know where the dancers were and a DJ in

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Speaker 6: one section and the main dance floor DJ there.

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Speaker 1: This is a man named Orlando Taurus, and he knows

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Speaker 1: the Pulse Nightclub well. Orlando has been going to the

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Speaker 1: club for more than ten years and he's become a

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Speaker 1: promoter of Latin Night. The night Omar Matine walks into Pulse,

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Speaker 1: It's Latin Night, It's Orlando's night, his event. Just before

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Speaker 1: last call, Orlando and a friend head to the bathroom.

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Speaker 1: They take a backway. Not a lot of people know.

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Speaker 6: About because, as I'm well known, I gotta always say

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Speaker 6: hello everybody, or you know, it's just never got to

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Speaker 6: get to the bathroom. You ain't got time to say

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Speaker 6: hello hello. Everybody stops show. You haven't seen one for

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Speaker 6: a while while you've been you know, so I took

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Speaker 6: the backway.

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Speaker 1: Orlando goes into the lady's room. The bathrooms that pulse

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Speaker 1: are marked men's and women's, but the signs don't really

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Speaker 1: mean anything. Anyone can use either bathroom.

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Speaker 6: All of a sudden, you know, I'm hearing pop pop pop.

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Speaker 6: You know, sounds very sharp and clear, crisp, crispy clear.

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Speaker 1: Orlando and his friend rush into a bathroom stall and

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Speaker 1: close the door. The two men climb up on the toilet,

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Speaker 1: hoping not to be seen.

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Speaker 6: If it was a gunman shooting out there, he wouldn't

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Speaker 6: see our feet.

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Speaker 1: Orlando props his butt on the toilet and then presses

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Speaker 1: his feet against the door in front of him. His

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Speaker 1: friend sits on the side of the toilet and lifts

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Speaker 1: his feet up. Orlando hears more gunshots. They're getting closer.

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Speaker 1: He also hears people running into the bathroom looking frantically

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Speaker 1: for a place to hide. Another clubgoer inside the same

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Speaker 1: bathroom calls nine one one.

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Speaker 4: Hello, God, this.

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Speaker 2: Is Arnest with their Land Police department on a record

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Speaker 2: a line you've phoned on nine one one? Is everything?

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Speaker 5: Okay?

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Speaker 2: No, no, no, no, please of the poll p U L

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Speaker 2: s E in Orlando for the shooting that he give

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Speaker 2: me how many people? How many people are shooting?

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Speaker 4: I think it's too I don't know how.

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Speaker 2: I'm in the bathroom a bunch of people and he's

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Speaker 2: shooting at everybody is leaving everywhere. Okay, from what you

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Speaker 2: can see, did you see the description and as see

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Speaker 2: white reppers, Hispanic you can pay, sant can home.

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Speaker 7: Okay, We're gonna go some hills for you.

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Speaker 4: Can you tell me anything that they weren't wearing.

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Speaker 2: Nona's am with you now stand A'm gonna do this.

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Speaker 7: Sus on the phone with us.

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Speaker 2: Don't hang up, stay on the phone.

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Speaker 1: The shooter enters the bathroom an assault rifle in his hands.

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Speaker 1: Orlando quietly pulls out his phone and I started recording.

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Speaker 6: I pressed my video record.

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Speaker 5: You can't know.

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Speaker 1: You can hear Orlando breathing as Omar in the background

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Speaker 1: speaks to the hostage negotiator. Omar says he's planted a bomb,

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Speaker 1: but he's bluffing away inside the bathroom. Cell phones are ringing,

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Speaker 1: the shooting has just hit the news, and concerned family

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Speaker 1: and friends are calling their loved ones. The attack at

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Speaker 1: the Pulse nightclub has been described many ways the deadliest

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Speaker 1: terrorist attack since nine to eleven, the deadliest mass shooting

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Speaker 1: in modern US history, which it was at the time,

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Speaker 1: but is no longer lest attack on a gay community

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Speaker 1: in US history, which it still is. I've been working

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Speaker 1: as a journalist here in Florida for two decades. For

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Speaker 1: much of that time, I've been covering with a critical eye,

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Speaker 1: the Federal Bureau of Investigation the FBI, the agency tasked

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Speaker 1: with the very difficult job of preventing terrorist tax and

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Speaker 1: mass shootings. I remember waking up that June morning at

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Speaker 1: my home in Saint Petersburg, Florida, just a two hour

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Speaker 1: drive from where the murders occurred, and seeing the images

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Speaker 1: on the news, police and emergency vehicles, their lights ablaze,

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Speaker 1: Patrons bloodied and shaken sitting on curbs and in nearby

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Speaker 1: parking lots, bodies on the ground covered with drapes to

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Speaker 1: give the deceased final dignity.

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Speaker 8: There are more than a list of names. There are

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Speaker 8: people who loved and were loved. There are people at

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Speaker 8: families and friends and dreams.

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Speaker 1: The tragedy becomes a national news event, with CNN's Anderson

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Speaker 1: Cooper on the scene hours after the attack. He reads

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Speaker 1: out the names of the victims.

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Speaker 8: Juan Ramon Gyerrero, his cousin, said, Juan came out to

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Speaker 8: his family just this year. I was afraid they might

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Speaker 8: not accept him, but they did.

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Speaker 9: He was twenty two.

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Speaker 8: Christopher Andrew, known as Drew.

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Speaker 9: He was Jan's boyfriend.

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Speaker 10: Well.

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Speaker 7: The shooter has been identified, of course, as Omar Mattein.

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Speaker 1: Journalists quickly framed the shooting as an act of terrorism.

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Speaker 7: In one of the early press conferences around seven am

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Speaker 7: this morning, you had an FBI official say that early

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Speaker 7: leads suggest that he was motivated by jihadist ideology.

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Speaker 1: But terrorism was only one motive. Were soon told Omar

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Speaker 1: also suffered from an intense internal conflict.

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Speaker 11: Our team, with new reporting as well on the gunman's

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Speaker 11: secret life.

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Speaker 1: Reporters and law enforcement broadcast that the shooter was also

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Speaker 1: secretly gay.

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Speaker 11: A former classmate is now coming forward. Also, patrons of

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Speaker 11: that Orlando nightclub, saying he'd been there many times before

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Speaker 11: and that he'd been on gay dating apps, and the

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Speaker 11: question now was he hiding a life at odds with

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Speaker 11: his strict faith.

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Speaker 1: This narrative took root because it seemed to make this

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Speaker 1: senseless tragedy makes sense. Several news organizations bring forward men

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Speaker 1: claiming to have had relationships with Omar, including one man

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Speaker 1: disguised with prosthetics and makeup his voice altered.

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Speaker 6: You had a relationship with Omar Martin?

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Speaker 4: Yes, I have a relationship with Oma Martin.

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Speaker 5: Did you have sex with him?

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Speaker 4: Yes, I do.

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Speaker 1: It all begins to add up. Attacking a gay nightclub

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Speaker 1: in Orlando allowed Omar to end the war inside of him.

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Speaker 1: Loretta Lynch, then the Attorney General, also endorses the narrative

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Speaker 1: that Omar had targeted Pulse because it was a gay club.

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Speaker 1: I cannot tell you definitively that we will ever narrow

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Speaker 1: it down to one motivation. People often act out of

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Speaker 1: more than one motivation. This was clearly an active terror

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Speaker 1: and an active hate. A flood of reports followed, claiming

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Speaker 1: that Omar was secretly gay and had been to Pulse

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Speaker 1: in the past.

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Speaker 8: Well sources, including the hometown newspaper here, The Orlando Central,

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Speaker 8: are now reporting that this was no the shooter's first

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Speaker 8: time at the Pulse nightclub. The Central reports that at

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Speaker 8: least four regular customers had seen him there before one

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Speaker 8: of the.

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Speaker 1: Cities, but none of this is true. Omar Matin, the shooter,

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Speaker 1: wasn't secretly gay. The FBI knew a lot about Omar

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Speaker 1: Matine for years before his mass shooting at Pulse. Federal

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Speaker 1: agents had investigated Omar twice based on concerns that he

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Speaker 1: might be a security threat, and the FBI promptly closed

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Speaker 1: both investigations. And that's because Omar Matin's father was a

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Speaker 1: confidential informant for the FBI. Sadik Matin secretly provided information

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Speaker 1: to federal agents for more than a decade. Sadik's work

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Speaker 1: was supposed to help the FBI identify potential terrorists, and

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Speaker 1: then his son kills forty nine people and claims to

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Speaker 1: pledge allegiance to a terrorist organization. Omar becomes the very

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Speaker 1: type of terrorist the FBI pays his father to fined.

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Speaker 1: For Sadik, this has the potential to threaten his livelihood

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Speaker 1: after his own son commits the deadliest terrorist attack in

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Speaker 1: the United States since nine to eleven, So Sadik takes

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Speaker 1: action just hours after the mass shooting, Omar's father starts

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Speaker 1: the false narrative that his son hated gay people and

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Speaker 1: targeted Pulse because it was a gay club.

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Speaker 6: Did he ever talk about homosexuality except one time that

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Speaker 6: we were in Miami we saw the behavior.

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Speaker 9: Of one couple and he got a little.

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Speaker 11: Bit ticked off.

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Speaker 3: What did he say?

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Speaker 10: Nothing, just look at this, and what did you say?

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Speaker 9: Well, there are two guys work kissing each other in

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Speaker 9: front of the family and the kids.

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Speaker 1: And this false narrative has a convenient effect. It allows

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Speaker 1: the FBI to avoid accountability. The day after the attack,

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Speaker 1: FBI Director James Comy claims the bureau has done nothing wrong.

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Speaker 2: I don't think so.

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Speaker 9: I don't see anything in reviewing our work that our

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Speaker 9: agents should have done differently. But we'll look at it

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Speaker 9: in an open, an honest way and be transparent about it.

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Speaker 1: The FBI has never been transparent about its failings, and

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Speaker 1: the bureau has never explained how federal agents let a

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Speaker 1: mass murderer slip through their fingers, not once, but twice.

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Speaker 1: As a journalist, I've covered the FBI's pursuit of alleged

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Speaker 1: terrorists for over fifteen years. My focus has been on

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Speaker 1: the FBI's use of sting operations, in which the FBI,

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Speaker 1: using an undercover agent or a paid informant, pretends to

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Speaker 1: be a terrorist and offers the opportunity for a would

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Speaker 1: be terrorist to move forward in an attack. The FBI

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Speaker 1: provides everything the targets of their stings need, money, transportation,

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Speaker 1: prop guns, and fake bombs, sometimes even the ideas for

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Speaker 1: the attacks. Since nine eleven, the FBI has napped more

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Speaker 1: than three hundred and fifty people in aggressive terrorism stings.

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Speaker 1: The overwhelming majority of these people didn't know an actual terrorist,

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Speaker 1: only the FBI agent or informant pretending to be one,

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Speaker 1: and many of the accused were easily manipulated due to

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Speaker 1: financial desperation or mental illness. The primary way the FBI

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Speaker 1: finds targets of these stings is through informants, and there

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Speaker 1: are more than fifteen thousand FBI informants today. They work

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Speaker 1: for the bureau in exchange for leniency on criminal charges

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Speaker 1: or to make money. FBI informants can make inexcess of

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Speaker 1: six figures a year. That's what Omar Matin's father, Sadiq,

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Speaker 1: was doing for more than a decade, providing information to

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Speaker 1: the FBI for counter terrorism investigations. The FBI has maintained

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Speaker 1: publicly that terrorism stings are necessary to keep Americans safe

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Speaker 1: to take off the street would be terrorists before they

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Speaker 1: have an opportunity to meet a real terrorist who might

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Speaker 1: help them launch an attack. The FBI's argument is plausible,

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Speaker 1: but hypothetical. It's never really happened. There's never been a

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Speaker 1: case of a would be terrorist with no connections, no money,

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Speaker 1: no weapons, suddenly happening upon an ISIS or all kind

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Speaker 1: of operative who provides all three. Hey, there would be terrorist.

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Speaker 1: How about a bomb? So I've wondered if the FBI's

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Speaker 1: counter terrorism strategy actually makes us less safe by distracting

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Speaker 1: federal agents from real threats. It's a theory that's difficult

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Speaker 1: to prove, but I started thinking more about this following

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Speaker 1: a trip to Chicago in February twenty twenty. This was

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Speaker 1: only a few years ago, but now seems like a

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Speaker 1: different time. What I didn't know then, what no one

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Speaker 1: knew then, was that in just a month's time a

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Speaker 1: pandemic would put much of the United States in lockdown.

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Speaker 1: And what I also didn't know then was that I'd

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Speaker 1: be here telling you about why I was in Chicago

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Speaker 1: in February twenty twenty. That's because I never expected to

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Speaker 1: report on or write about any of this. I was

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Speaker 1: in Chicago to attend an event hosted by the Muslim

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Speaker 1: Legal Fund, a nonprofit that funds legal defenses in cases

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Speaker 1: of abuse of prosecutions under anti terrorism laws. At this event,

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Speaker 1: I'd soon meet the person authorities said could have stopped

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Speaker 1: the Pulse shooting but didn't. Two years earlier, in twenty eighteen,

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Speaker 1: Nor Salman, the widow of the Pulse nightclub shooter Omar Matin,

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Speaker 1: won an acquittal at trial. The Justice Department alleged that

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Speaker 1: Nor assisted with the planning of Omar's attack and provided

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Speaker 1: misleading statements to investigators. Federal prosecutor's evidence included a lengthy

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Speaker 1: and detailed confession written by an FBI agent and signed

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Speaker 1: by Nor less than twelve hours after the shooting, but

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Speaker 1: a federal jury rejected the confession as coerced and false,

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Speaker 1: along with the rest of the evidence the Justice Department presented.

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Speaker 1: Nor's acquittal was extraordinary. In the two decades after the

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Speaker 1: nine to eleven attacks, Muslims charged with terrorism in the

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Speaker 1: United States have faced daunting odds before juries of their Peers.

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Speaker 1: Nearly one thousand people have been charged under anti terrorism

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Speaker 1: law since nine one eleven, and just three people, including Nor,

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Speaker 1: have been acquitted at trial. Just three people. Tonight, nor

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Speaker 1: Selman leaving the courthouse without a word.

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Speaker 9: Outrage from victims' families.

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Speaker 1: Nor's acquittal made national news, with much of the coverage

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Speaker 1: focused on the gay communities, outrage that she had not

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Speaker 1: been held accountable.

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Speaker 9: She knew that her husband was doing what he was doing,

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Speaker 9: and shame on her.

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Speaker 8: I am in this belief is to feel like we've

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Speaker 8: been slapped in the face.

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Speaker 1: At this conference in Chicago, Nor was scheduled to speak

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Speaker 1: what was to be her first public comments since her acquittal.

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Speaker 1: There was a reception beforehand, and people were milling about

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Speaker 1: talking to old friends and colleagues. I saw Nor off

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Speaker 1: to the side at a table with her son. She

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Speaker 1: looked uncomfortable, so I walked over and introduced myself. She

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Speaker 1: was wearing a black d that matched her long black hair.

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Speaker 1: We exchanged small talk. She told me about her son,

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Speaker 1: who was just a couple of years older than my daughter,

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Speaker 1: and she confessed that she was nervous. I've never given

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Speaker 1: a speech before. Nor told me blur out the crowd

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Speaker 1: in your mind, as if you're looking into a camera

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Speaker 1: that's out of focus. I suggested, that's what I do.

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Speaker 1: I don't know, she said softly. I just don't know

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Speaker 1: how to do any of this. As Nor confided in me,

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Speaker 1: I looked over to see her son sitting at the table,

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Speaker 1: his head stooped over a Nintendo switch. He was playing Fortnite,

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Speaker 1: what was then and continues to be the world's most

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Speaker 1: popular video game. In the game, you battle other players

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Speaker 1: with an arsenal of weapons handguns, shotguns, machine guns, rocket launchers.

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Speaker 1: Nora's son, Omar's son was sitting there, navigating the video game,

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Speaker 1: with his character firing round after round from a gun

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Speaker 1: very similar to the one his father youth. I found

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Speaker 1: this moment simultaneously confusing and enraging. How could he play

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Speaker 1: this game here? How could she allow him to play it?

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Speaker 1: I was thinking all this as Nor stood there next

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Speaker 1: to me, vulnerable, describing how she was so nervous about

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Speaker 1: what she needed to do, but how she was shy,

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Speaker 1: how she lacked confidence, and how she wasn't sure if

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Speaker 1: she just freeze up when placed in front of people.

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Speaker 1: I realized then that I was being unfair Nor in

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Speaker 1: her son didn't kill anyone. They weren't responsible. Against extraordinary odds,

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Speaker 1: the federal jury acquitted her. I also realized that I

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Speaker 1: allowed my assumptions about her and what happened to color

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Speaker 1: my opinion. But I wasn't the only one. Many Americans

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Speaker 1: did this, assumed that she was somehow responsible and had

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Speaker 1: gotten away with it. Wife should have known. Many of

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Speaker 1: us were guilty of thinking that. A part of me,

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Speaker 1: deep down wanted to blame Nor. A little bit later

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Speaker 1: that evening in Chicago, I took one of Nor's lawyers aside.

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Speaker 1: Charlie Swift was dressed in a suit, his tie not

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Speaker 1: slightly loosened, and he stared at me intensely through his glasses.

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Speaker 1: Charlie leaned in toward me, uncomfortably close. He has a

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Speaker 1: habit of doing this. He's a close talker.

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Speaker 5: About a month in they turned over and we located

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Speaker 5: inside the discovery Omar matined and Nora Solomon's cell phone.

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Speaker 1: Records, Charlie's describing how the Justice Department gave him the

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Speaker 1: evidence in Nor's case. Nor's supposed confession made a few

359
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Speaker 1: specific claims that Omar targeted Pulse in advance, that she

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Speaker 1: and Omar had previously surveiled the club and that she

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Speaker 1: was aware of his plans for the attack, But data

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Speaker 1: transmitted by Omar's phone and Norris phone didn't support any

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Speaker 1: of that.

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Speaker 5: We'd identified that tower by the pulse. It's pretty close,

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Speaker 5: and we went and looked for that tower in either

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Speaker 5: of their cell phone records and it didn't exist, not

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Speaker 5: until the night of the shooting.

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Speaker 1: The phone tower closest to Pulse had communicated with Omar's

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Speaker 1: phone only on the night of the shooting, and it

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Speaker 1: had never communicated with Norris phone. So Charlie hired an

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Speaker 1: expert to analyze data from the tower and the phones.

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Speaker 5: He was able to tell beyond that, okay, which direction

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Speaker 5: is it receiving. He was able to tell the speed

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Speaker 5: at which they were traveling. He was able to find

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Speaker 5: fragments inside it on directions and searches that were there

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Speaker 5: from that night. And he calls us back a week

377
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Speaker 5: later and he goes, he did never search for the pulse,

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Speaker 5: and he drove by it at random. And I go, Richard,

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Speaker 5: that's a provocative statement. Can you prove that? He goes

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Speaker 5: come to Florida. So I got on a plane and

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Speaker 5: I flew to Florida, and he put up the first

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Speaker 5: of a PowerPoint that would be admitted at trial, perfected,

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Speaker 5: and I go, oh my god, wow.

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Speaker 1: What Charlie and his defense team discovered was completely at

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Speaker 1: odds with the public's understanding of what happened. The cell

386
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Speaker 1: phone data revealed that Omar took a random route to

387
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Speaker 1: Pulse and suggested that he chose the club as his

388
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Speaker 1: target at the last minute. The data also appeared to

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Speaker 1: prove that there was no way that Nor's confession could

390
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Speaker 1: be true. Omar may not have even realized Pulse was

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Speaker 1: a gay club when he walked in with an assault rifle.

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Speaker 1: Why has the false narrative that Omar was secretly gay

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Speaker 1: and specifically targeted Pulse persisted because that narrative has been

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Speaker 1: useful for the government.

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Speaker 5: They had excuses, it's part of an ongoing investigation, blah

396
00:26:13,480 --> 00:26:17,120
Speaker 5: blah blah. But they would allow facts that were they

397
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Speaker 5: knew to be false to continue to circulate in the

398
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Speaker 5: media because it hit their narrative. It's an easy narrative.

399
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Speaker 5: When you first heard it, you heard there's been a

400
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Speaker 5: mass shooting at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida, and

401
00:26:35,600 --> 00:26:40,480
Speaker 5: they led with gay nightclub. Your immediate part was somebody

402
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Speaker 5: who hates gay and lesbian persons. Perhaps your first picture

403
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Speaker 5: was not of a Muslim. Perhaps your first picture was

404
00:26:47,960 --> 00:26:51,160
Speaker 5: of some right wing militia that thought gay people should die.

405
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Speaker 5: Because there have been so many of that in the news,

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Speaker 5: so you're putting together the facts for it. Then you hear, oh,

407
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Speaker 5: he's a Muslim. Well, okay, they hate gays too. Your

408
00:27:02,280 --> 00:27:06,680
Speaker 5: mind flashes to these reports that Muslims in extremist countries

409
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Speaker 5: have executed, killed, murdered gay people.

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Speaker 1: That night in Chicago, Charlie told me that I needed

411
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Speaker 1: to look into the case, that this was really a

412
00:27:19,920 --> 00:27:22,200
Speaker 1: story about FBI accountability.

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Speaker 5: The FBI is extraordinarily sophisticated when it comes to pr

414
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Speaker 5: and it is months, sometimes years, before we learn of

415
00:27:35,960 --> 00:27:40,320
Speaker 5: malfeasance in many cases, or problems on it. They hide

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Speaker 5: it brilliantly.

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Speaker 1: At the end of the conference, nor stood up in

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Speaker 1: front of everyone to speak. Through tears. She was able

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Speaker 1: to read a few lines from notes as Charlie stood

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Speaker 1: beside her.

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Speaker 10: There are my case. My family suffered so much. My

422
00:27:59,480 --> 00:28:03,080
Speaker 10: mother's he hell disoriented, my uncle who was here with me,

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Speaker 10: lost so much weight, and my sister was bullied at school,

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Speaker 10: but they stood by me, just as all of you

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Speaker 10: are staying with me today.

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Speaker 1: A year or so after the Chicago conference, I started

427
00:28:21,680 --> 00:28:26,040
Speaker 1: reviewing the government's case against Norsalman, pouring over transcripts and exhibits,

428
00:28:26,520 --> 00:28:30,240
Speaker 1: and I was examining other cases too, the local investigations

429
00:28:30,240 --> 00:28:34,639
Speaker 1: the FBI was conducting when agents weren't investigating Omar Matin.

430
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Speaker 1: Through an examination of the Pulse nightclub shooting and what

431
00:28:38,920 --> 00:28:42,040
Speaker 1: the FBI did and didn't do, I was coming to

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Speaker 1: realize that the Bureau has had a very good reason

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Speaker 1: for wanting to hide behind a false narrative. The FBI's

434
00:28:48,320 --> 00:28:52,520
Speaker 1: entire program to identify and thwart would be terrorists actually

435
00:28:52,640 --> 00:28:58,240
Speaker 1: makes us less safe. The Pulse nightclub shooting happened not

436
00:28:58,440 --> 00:29:01,040
Speaker 1: in spite of the FBI's efforts to stop such attacks,

437
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Speaker 1: but because of those efforts.

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Speaker 2: So there's like twenty five people that are Yeah, this

439
00:29:17,720 --> 00:29:21,120
Speaker 2: is like the biggest mass shooting fucking way worse.

440
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Speaker 1: This is from police body camera footage in the minutes

441
00:29:25,720 --> 00:29:29,360
Speaker 1: after the Pulse nightclub shooting, the responding officers are comparing

442
00:29:29,680 --> 00:29:32,600
Speaker 1: this mass shooting to one that happened seven months earlier

443
00:29:32,960 --> 00:29:36,120
Speaker 1: in San Bernardino, there's just twenty five people.

444
00:29:36,200 --> 00:29:39,920
Speaker 11: Done you ever prere shoppy people dying in that?

445
00:29:40,000 --> 00:29:40,080
Speaker 10: One?

446
00:29:40,120 --> 00:29:42,880
Speaker 2: Can never any nice? Nine nine.

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00:29:43,360 --> 00:29:49,600
Speaker 1: When the Pulse nightclub shooting happened in June twenty sixteen,

448
00:29:50,480 --> 00:29:54,280
Speaker 1: it was the deadliest mass shooting in American history. That

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00:29:54,400 --> 00:29:56,520
Speaker 1: distinction only lasted for a little more than a year

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00:29:56,920 --> 00:30:00,280
Speaker 1: until October twenty seventeen, when a gun ma on the

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00:30:00,360 --> 00:30:02,640
Speaker 1: thirty second floor of the Mandalay Bay Hotel in Las

452
00:30:02,720 --> 00:30:06,400
Speaker 1: Vegas fired more than one thousand bullets into a music

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00:30:06,480 --> 00:30:11,120
Speaker 1: festival below, killing sixty people in wounding more than four hundred.

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00:30:13,440 --> 00:30:17,160
Speaker 1: We live in an age of mass shootings, and the

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00:30:17,240 --> 00:30:20,320
Speaker 1: agency task with a difficult job of preventing them is

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00:30:20,400 --> 00:30:24,080
Speaker 1: the FBI. That isn't just because the FBI is the

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00:30:24,160 --> 00:30:28,600
Speaker 1: nation's top law enforcement agency. Following the nine to eleven attacks,

458
00:30:28,920 --> 00:30:33,120
Speaker 1: the FBI's top priority became counter terrorism, including stopping high

459
00:30:33,200 --> 00:30:38,479
Speaker 1: casualty incidents like mass shootings before they happen. It's an

460
00:30:38,600 --> 00:30:42,760
Speaker 1: understandably difficult job, but the FBI has vast powers meant

461
00:30:42,800 --> 00:30:46,360
Speaker 1: to make that job possible, specifically, a post nine to

462
00:30:46,360 --> 00:30:49,960
Speaker 1: eleven power known as an assessment, that allows the FBI

463
00:30:50,040 --> 00:30:55,080
Speaker 1: to investigate anyone for just about any reason, so long

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00:30:55,160 --> 00:30:58,480
Speaker 1: as agents believe that person might be a security threat.

465
00:31:00,000 --> 00:31:02,440
Speaker 1: In other words, if an FBI agent comes across an

466
00:31:02,440 --> 00:31:06,080
Speaker 1: anonymous social media post claiming that a specific person is

467
00:31:06,200 --> 00:31:10,360
Speaker 1: planning a mass shooting, that's all that's needed to launch

468
00:31:10,360 --> 00:31:15,320
Speaker 1: an investigation, no reasonable suspicion required. As is typically the

469
00:31:15,400 --> 00:31:20,440
Speaker 1: case for opening criminal investigations, FBI agents are looking for

470
00:31:20,560 --> 00:31:24,600
Speaker 1: what they term leakage, when would be shooters intentionally or

471
00:31:25,240 --> 00:31:30,320
Speaker 1: unintentionally reveal clues about their murderous plans. But based on

472
00:31:30,400 --> 00:31:34,360
Speaker 1: cases we know details about, the bureau doesn't have the

473
00:31:34,400 --> 00:31:39,520
Speaker 1: best track record. After the mass shooting at Marjorie Stone

474
00:31:39,560 --> 00:31:42,720
Speaker 1: and Douglas High School in Florida in twenty eighteen, in

475
00:31:42,800 --> 00:31:46,600
Speaker 1: which seventeen people were killed and seventeen others injured, the

476
00:31:46,800 --> 00:31:50,360
Speaker 1: FBI acknowledged that agents had received a tip reporting that

477
00:31:50,440 --> 00:31:54,560
Speaker 1: the future shooter was planning such an attack that our

478
00:31:54,680 --> 00:31:59,920
Speaker 1: agents ignored the tip. More recently, in twenty twenty two,

479
00:32:00,120 --> 00:32:04,000
Speaker 1: you a mass shooting in Colorado Springs drew comparisons to

480
00:32:04,040 --> 00:32:04,880
Speaker 1: the one at.

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00:32:04,840 --> 00:32:09,280
Speaker 12: Pulse just before midnight last night in Colorado Springs, at

482
00:32:09,320 --> 00:32:11,880
Speaker 12: a nightclub known as one of the safest places in

483
00:32:12,000 --> 00:32:15,440
Speaker 12: town for the LGBTQ community. At first, people on the

484
00:32:15,520 --> 00:32:18,040
Speaker 12: dance floor thought the gunshots were part of the music,

485
00:32:18,440 --> 00:32:22,240
Speaker 12: stunned to realize it was gunfire and I'm hearing about The.

486
00:32:22,480 --> 00:32:25,960
Speaker 1: Club Q gunman was tackled by a patron, preventing what

487
00:32:26,000 --> 00:32:30,800
Speaker 1: would have otherwise been a deadlier attack. Five people were killed.

488
00:32:31,920 --> 00:32:35,440
Speaker 1: The murderer ran a neo Nazi website, and he was

489
00:32:35,760 --> 00:32:39,480
Speaker 1: motivated by hatred for gay people. In that case, the

490
00:32:39,600 --> 00:32:43,160
Speaker 1: gunman's family had reported to the FBI the previous year

491
00:32:43,880 --> 00:32:46,200
Speaker 1: that he was building a bomb and making death threats.

492
00:32:46,920 --> 00:32:50,440
Speaker 1: The FBI opened an investigation of the man, but closed

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00:32:50,480 --> 00:32:57,040
Speaker 1: that investigation less than a month later. Instead, the FBI

494
00:32:57,200 --> 00:33:02,360
Speaker 1: in Colorado Springs ran sting operations against racial justice activists.

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00:33:03,520 --> 00:33:07,480
Speaker 2: I'm Brandon Kimpball with Drew Rosen and the detective Love

496
00:33:08,120 --> 00:33:12,240
Speaker 2: and at the FBI Colorados Brings Out office.

497
00:33:13,360 --> 00:33:15,680
Speaker 1: In a recorded conversation with one of the activists just

498
00:33:15,760 --> 00:33:18,640
Speaker 1: a few months before the Club Q shooting, an agent

499
00:33:18,720 --> 00:33:22,160
Speaker 1: acknowledged what the FBI was doing and then said this

500
00:33:22,760 --> 00:33:23,960
Speaker 1: as if predicting the future.

501
00:33:24,760 --> 00:33:28,280
Speaker 9: We want to keep everybody safe. It's just obviously our

502
00:33:28,480 --> 00:33:30,560
Speaker 9: we'd like to say, our successes generally don't make the

503
00:33:30,640 --> 00:33:32,960
Speaker 9: news is and we screw up, it's because something went

504
00:33:32,960 --> 00:33:34,200
Speaker 9: boom or there is a mass shooting.

505
00:33:35,360 --> 00:33:42,960
Speaker 1: So what's unique about Pulse, beyond the scale of the tragedy,

506
00:33:43,720 --> 00:33:45,280
Speaker 1: is that it was a mass shooting that the FBI

507
00:33:45,840 --> 00:33:50,160
Speaker 1: made promises about. The bureau promised that agents would give

508
00:33:50,240 --> 00:33:54,040
Speaker 1: us a full accounting of what happened and whether the

509
00:33:54,080 --> 00:33:56,040
Speaker 1: attack could have been prevented.

510
00:33:57,800 --> 00:34:00,360
Speaker 11: All right, good afternoon, everyone, and thank thank you all

511
00:34:00,440 --> 00:34:01,280
Speaker 11: for being here today.

512
00:34:02,400 --> 00:34:05,560
Speaker 1: The day after the pulsnight club shooting, FBI Director James

513
00:34:05,640 --> 00:34:09,239
Speaker 1: Comy joined Sally Yates, the Deputy Attorney General, in a

514
00:34:09,280 --> 00:34:10,000
Speaker 1: press conference.

515
00:34:11,160 --> 00:34:14,279
Speaker 11: We're here to discuss the Justice Department's response to this

516
00:34:14,440 --> 00:34:17,360
Speaker 11: stunning and unconscionable acts in Orlando.

517
00:34:18,680 --> 00:34:22,040
Speaker 1: Comy makes clear on the first day of the investigation

518
00:34:22,880 --> 00:34:26,800
Speaker 1: that federal agents view the attack as an act of terrorism.

519
00:34:28,000 --> 00:34:32,360
Speaker 9: There are strong indications of radicalization by this killer and

520
00:34:32,480 --> 00:34:37,880
Speaker 9: of potential inspiration by foreign terrorist organizations. We are spending

521
00:34:37,920 --> 00:34:40,520
Speaker 9: a tremendous amount of time, as you would imagine, trying

522
00:34:40,600 --> 00:34:44,360
Speaker 9: to understand every moment of this killer's path to that

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00:34:44,520 --> 00:34:47,600
Speaker 9: terrible night in Orlando. To understand his motives and to

524
00:34:47,719 --> 00:34:49,600
Speaker 9: understand the details of his life.

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00:34:50,800 --> 00:34:54,800
Speaker 1: Here for the first time in public, Director Comy admits

526
00:34:55,160 --> 00:34:59,040
Speaker 1: that the FBI had previously investigated Omar Matine.

527
00:35:00,080 --> 00:35:05,799
Speaker 9: Our investigation involved introducing confidential sources to him, recording conversations

528
00:35:05,840 --> 00:35:11,120
Speaker 9: with him, following him, reviewing transactional records from his communications,

529
00:35:11,920 --> 00:35:15,839
Speaker 9: and searching all government holdings for any possible connections, any

530
00:35:15,960 --> 00:35:17,880
Speaker 9: possible derogatory information.

531
00:35:19,160 --> 00:35:24,080
Speaker 1: The FBI knew Omartin very well and long before he

532
00:35:24,160 --> 00:35:28,279
Speaker 1: walked into Pulse. But Komy assures the American public that

533
00:35:28,400 --> 00:35:31,200
Speaker 1: the FBI will continue to investigate what happened in Orlando,

534
00:35:32,080 --> 00:35:35,279
Speaker 1: and he promises the bureau will be transparent about its

535
00:35:35,320 --> 00:35:36,040
Speaker 1: own failings.

536
00:35:37,960 --> 00:35:41,160
Speaker 9: We will continue to look forward in this investigation and backward.

537
00:35:41,800 --> 00:35:45,200
Speaker 9: We will leave no stone unturned, and we will work

538
00:35:45,960 --> 00:35:48,480
Speaker 9: all day and all night to understand the path to

539
00:35:48,560 --> 00:35:52,359
Speaker 9: that terrible night. We're also going to look hard at

540
00:35:52,360 --> 00:35:54,320
Speaker 9: our own work to see whether there is something we

541
00:35:54,360 --> 00:35:57,320
Speaker 9: should have done differently. So far, the honest answer is

542
00:35:57,480 --> 00:35:59,880
Speaker 9: I don't think so. I don't see anything in reviewing

543
00:36:00,080 --> 00:36:02,560
Speaker 9: our work that our agents should have done differently. But

544
00:36:02,640 --> 00:36:04,520
Speaker 9: we'll look at it in an open and honest way.

545
00:36:04,800 --> 00:36:08,400
Speaker 9: And be transparent about it. Our work is very challenging.

546
00:36:08,520 --> 00:36:12,640
Speaker 9: We are looking for needles in a nationwide haystack, but

547
00:36:12,760 --> 00:36:15,160
Speaker 9: we're also called upon to figure out which pieces of

548
00:36:15,280 --> 00:36:18,759
Speaker 9: hay might someday become needles. That is hard work. If

549
00:36:18,800 --> 00:36:21,319
Speaker 9: we can find a way to do that better, we will.

550
00:36:24,160 --> 00:36:28,479
Speaker 1: But agents could have done things differently. They'd already found

551
00:36:28,560 --> 00:36:33,799
Speaker 1: Come's needle and a haystack. The FBI won't release any

552
00:36:33,880 --> 00:36:37,840
Speaker 1: information about this to this day. The bureau claims that

553
00:36:37,960 --> 00:36:43,120
Speaker 1: Omar Matine's file remains part of an open investigation, preventing

554
00:36:43,160 --> 00:36:47,440
Speaker 1: its disclosure to the public. So over the next seven episodes,

555
00:36:47,800 --> 00:36:50,439
Speaker 1: I'm going to lay out what I've discovered about Omar

556
00:36:50,520 --> 00:36:54,360
Speaker 1: Matine and the Pulse nightclub shooting, and why the FBI

557
00:36:55,080 --> 00:36:57,840
Speaker 1: doesn't want what's in their files to be revealed.

558
00:36:58,960 --> 00:37:02,480
Speaker 8: There's a relationship, a long relationship, two decades long relationship

559
00:37:02,520 --> 00:37:04,919
Speaker 8: between the FBI and Almarmantine's father.

560
00:37:05,920 --> 00:37:08,960
Speaker 1: I'll introduce you to people who knew Omar and his father.

561
00:37:10,040 --> 00:37:13,280
Speaker 9: He could be full of rage, especially if he spoke

562
00:37:13,320 --> 00:37:13,600
Speaker 9: to that.

563
00:37:13,760 --> 00:37:15,560
Speaker 10: So there were times where he would get into a

564
00:37:15,600 --> 00:37:18,000
Speaker 10: fight with his dad and then come take it out

565
00:37:18,040 --> 00:37:18,200
Speaker 10: on me.

566
00:37:19,280 --> 00:37:22,040
Speaker 1: This is the story of a father and son and

567
00:37:22,200 --> 00:37:27,040
Speaker 1: their relationship with the FBI. His father was an FBI informant,

568
00:37:27,840 --> 00:37:30,160
Speaker 1: and it is possibility that Omar may have known that

569
00:37:30,320 --> 00:37:32,080
Speaker 1: and maybe a way to get back at his father

570
00:37:32,920 --> 00:37:35,799
Speaker 1: and how a false narrative was created which covered up

571
00:37:35,840 --> 00:37:36,600
Speaker 1: that relationship.

572
00:37:37,320 --> 00:37:42,160
Speaker 13: They start to ask me a questions. I start to wondering, Nai,

573
00:37:42,760 --> 00:37:46,879
Speaker 13: we won all your accounts from grind there, and also

574
00:37:46,920 --> 00:37:50,680
Speaker 13: they start to say, are you sure you meant Ohmar?

575
00:37:51,000 --> 00:37:52,839
Speaker 13: I say yes, I'm very sure.

576
00:37:53,920 --> 00:37:56,960
Speaker 3: This is the narrative that people are living with that

577
00:37:57,120 --> 00:38:01,080
Speaker 3: this man went out and slaughtered forty nine people and

578
00:38:01,160 --> 00:38:05,920
Speaker 3: wounded fifty three others because they were gay, which is

579
00:38:06,400 --> 00:38:07,240
Speaker 3: utterly false.

580
00:38:11,040 --> 00:38:31,480
Speaker 1: This is Pulse the Untold Story. All eight episodes are

581
00:38:31,520 --> 00:38:35,440
Speaker 1: available now on Audible. Search for Pulse the Untold Story

582
00:38:35,640 --> 00:38:38,160
Speaker 1: on the Audible app, or go to audible dot com

583
00:38:38,280 --> 00:38:42,279
Speaker 1: slash Pulse the Untold Story. Start listening today when you

584
00:38:42,320 --> 00:38:45,359
Speaker 1: sign up for a free thirty day trial. For more

585
00:38:45,400 --> 00:38:49,080
Speaker 1: on Pulse the Untold Story, Alphabet Boys, or my other reporting,

586
00:38:49,440 --> 00:38:52,680
Speaker 1: subscribe to my newsletter at Trevor Aaronson dot substack dot com.

587
00:38:53,320 --> 00:38:56,279
Speaker 1: Subscribers receive news and updates, as well as promo codes

588
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Speaker 1: to access new releases,