Defense Witnesses Took the Stand in Quick Succession

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Delvas Salman is the Uncle of Noor Salman. He has lived in Rodeo California since 1971. He spoke of Noor with affection. When he recalled when she introduced Omar Mateen to the family he remembered saying to him, “I trust you with my niece.” He got choked up with that memory and had to take a sip of water to recover his composure. Most of Mr. Salman’s testimony painted a picture of his niece as a simple and caring woman. Noor was in an arranged marriage with an abusive man before she married Omar.

Mustafa Abasin is Omar Mateen’s brother in law, married to Mateen’s sister. He was close to Noor Salman because he has children around the same age as her son. Since she didn’t have a drivers license, he would sometimes drive her places.  He said when he talked with her on the car rides it was more like having a conversation with a child.

Noor would offer to watch his children and she refused to take money for the service. She just liked taking care of kids. When she and her son were escorted to the FBI offices to be interrogated, she didn’t know she would be there as long as she was. She was interrogated for over 11 hours. Mustafa was the family member who drove to the FBI offices to pick up her son when he grew restless. Mustafa stopped inn back of the building and walked up to ring the bell. Her son was in a separate room from his mother. The FBI agent said, “She stays.” Many hours later when Noor came to pick up her son at Mustafa’s home, she was visibly upset. She was concerned about her son, fearing that she would loose him because of threads and implications from the FBI agents who spoke to her.

FBI Agent Kubini Martin was invited to the stand as a hostile witness by the defense. He was part of the original investigation team. He stated that Saddiqui Mateen, Omar’s dad was an  FBI informant from 2006 to 2016. As an informant it is kind of insane that he would have no idea of his son’s obsession with ISIS and hisplanned violence of Jihad. Saddiqui claimed ties to Al Qaeda, a militant Sunni Islamist multi-national organization founded in 1988 by Osama bin Laden, as well as Hezbollah, a Shi’a Islamist political party and militant group based in Lebanon.

The FBI launched its first assessment of Omar Mateen in 2013 after he
had allegedly boasted to co-workers at G4S, a security company, that he
had terrorist connections. The FBI reported that it had closed the
investigation after Mateen told agents he made the comment to scare his
co-workers, who were reportedly mocking his religion. One year after closing that first assessment, the FBI opened a second,
spurred by Mateen’s relationship with Moner Mohammad Abusalha, a Florida
man who became the first American suicide bomber in Syria.
Mateen and Abusalha attended the same mosque on Florida’s Atlantic
coast. The FBI, decided that Mateen’s contact with Abusalha was minimal,
closed that assessment as well. The FBI considered turning the younger Mateen into an FBI informant after they investigated him in 2013 and 2014.

Noor was in the house for each of the interviews by the FBI.  She served refreshments including a cake that the agent admitted was delicious. She left the first interview but was there for most of the last interview. Saddique Mateen showed up at that interview as well. The agent speculated about why Saddique had shown up. Had Noor called him? There is also speculation that the investigations might have been shut down because Saddique as an informant told them that they should not be concerned with the actions of his son.

Joshua Horowitz is a cyber forensic consultant. He described Incognito Mode, which allows users who don’t want Google Chrome to remember their activity, to browse the web privately. Omar Mateen last used incognito mode on June 6, 2016 at 9:06 AM. Most of Omar’s searches of ISIS and other terrorist organizations however were done in plain sight. Noor Salman had confessed that on June 10, 2016, Omar showed her the Pulse website on his computer and said, “That is my target.” Joshua was tasked with looking at all the digital devices of Noor and Omar and he came to the conclusion that there is no evidence that Omar showed Noor the Pulse website on June 10th.

He had 3 computers to review along with 4 cell phones and a tablet. Of those devices only a Dell computer and 2 Samsung phones were relevant to the case. The Dell computer had never visited the Pulse website. Incognito mode doesn’t mask web traffic to sites IP addresses. He confirmed that the computer never accessed the Pulse website server. The two cell phone never accessed the Pulse website prior to June 12, 2016. Noor Salman’s phone never visited the Pulse website. Around the time Noor claimed that Omar showed her the Pulse website, he was actually at work.


Richard Connor has done digital forensics since 2006. He performed the forensics on the cell phones of Omar and Noor. He used cell phone tower information and google maps on Omar’s phone to track his activities that night. 

Around 10 a.m. Omar went to Disney Springs. It is possible that this was his intended target that night. Video surveillance showed Omar walking alone through Disney Springs to House of Blues where he brought a t shirt which he later dis-guarded. There was a large police presence near House of Blues that night. Omar left and drove past Epcot. At 12:22 a.m. he searched for Orlando Nightclubs and he put Eve into his goggle maps to get directions too the downtown Orlando Club. Mateen got near EVE (110 South Orange Avenue) about 12:55 a.m. That club had significant security at the entrance and each guest is searched before they can enter.

He did another search in Google for Orlando Nightclubs and found Pulse which he put into google maps. The exact audio directions in that female voice played in the courtroom for Omar’s every move that night. He seemed to drive aimlessly around downtown Orlando and then he drove right past my downtown apartment building before turning south on Summerlin Avenue. He arrived at Pulse around 1:12 and 1:16 a.m. at Pulse, drove around a bit and then at 1:33 a.m. he did another Google search for Eve. He started to head in that direction at 1:34 a.m. but then turned around one minute later and went back to Pulse. He started ignoring the audio  directions he was getting. At 2 a.m. he fired the first shots into helpless victims at the club who were dancing and celebrating after the evenings last call for drinks. The phone in his pocket was still giving him verbal directions as he killed 49 people.

Noor Zahi Salman Evidence Suppression Hearing.

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Noor Salman walked into the Federal Courtroom with shackles around her ankles.  She wore a suit and had her hair clipped back in a pony tail.  The two guards escorting her were in black suits.  When she was seated, they stooped below her table and removed the shackles. Noor was the wife of Omar Mateen who killed 49 people and injured 68 others in the Pulse Nightclub massacre.  Salman is charged with aiding and abetting her husband, and obstruction for allegedly misleading investigators in Fort Pierce. She has pleaded not guilty to these charges. This hearing on December 21st was being held so her lawyers could attempt to suppress evidence obtained by the FBI that would incriminate her.  The judge on the bench was Paul G. Byron.

The first witness was Andrew Brennen who, at the time of the shooting, was working as an extra security guard at Native Nightclub in Downtown Orlando.  He is now a retired Master Sargent with the Orlando Police Department who had been in charge of digital forensics and crisis/hostage negotiations.  When he heard of the shooting, he immediately shut down Native Nightclub because a mass murderer could potentially target other clubs on a shooting spree.  He immediately drove down to Pulse to help.  He was moved to the communications center.  Within minutes, a dispatcher received a call from someone claiming to be the shooter.  Exhibits 1A and 1B were presented which were audio and transcripts of Mateen’s call.  Brennan then attempted both successful and unsuccessful contact with Omar 77 times.  At 2:49 AM Omar told Brennan to tell America to stop bombing Syria and Iraq and that they were killing innocent women and children.  Brennan then asked if Omar had done anything yet, in an attempt to verify that he was indeed the gunman. Brennan acquired Omar’s name and started using it, saying that using a name can build rapport and more meaningful dialogue.  In another call Omar claimed there was a bomb in a vehicle with enough explosives to take out an entire city block.

The second witness was Lieutenant William Hall from the Fort Pierce Police Department.  At 3:13 AM he received a call from the Orlando Police Department asking him to check 2513 South 17th street, Apartment 107 in Fort Pierce and to be wary of possible explosives and booby traps.  They formulated a plan and one hour later called the residence.  A female answered.  Officers wearing bullet proof vests approached the apartment from a guarded position at the end of a hall with guns drawn.  Noor Salman was requested to exit the apartment and she did, wearing pajamas. When she exited, Hall lowered his AR50 riffle and handed it off to another officer.   She was asked if anyone else was inside and she answered that just her 3 year old son was.  Police entered the residence and, after a visual check, found no explosives.  Hall wanted to evacuate her from the apartment and she asked if she could change.  He allowed her to change in her bedroom, unaccompanied by police.  When she came back out, Hall was surprised when she pulled out a cell phone which could potentially be used to detonate a bomb. In cross examination he changed his story saying the phone had been on the table and Noor asked if she could bring it along.  Noor was not touched or cuffed.  She was escorted to his unmarked Crown Victoria police car and he had her sit in the backseat with the AC running and the car door open.  Her son went to sleep in the back seat next to her.  Out of the blue, Salman said that her husband was very careful with guns and that he would never hurt anybody. No officer had mentioned guns or bodily harm by her husband.  The main point of contention during this time is if Noor felt she was was under arrest.  She was not cuffed and had not been read her Miranda rights.

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 The third witness was Mustafa Abasin, the brother in law of the shooter.  FBI had visited him on the Morning of June 12.  Salman’s son Zachariah needed to be picked up and Abasin has 2 sons, so it made sense for him to pick up her son since he already had a child car seat.  Mustafa was asked many questions about how he felt Noor was treated when he picked up her son.  He didn’t recall any aggression, officers didn’t block her from his view and they weren’t mean in any way when he was there.  That night Salman came to his home to pick up her son.  She was crying and claimed that the FBI threatened to hold her son if she didn’t tell them what was happening.

The fourth witness was Paul Ostillo who has been an Orlando Resident Agency FBI agent and bomb technician for ten years.  He also worked in counter terrorism.  At 3:40 AM he received a call from the Orange County Sheriff’s Bomb Squad and was authorized to assist.  He arrived at Pulse at 4:40 AM and saw squad cars, victims, survivors, and first responders everywhere.  He made his way to the command post south of Pulse.  Exhibit 26 was a diagram of the Pulse Nightclub.  Ostello pointed out where the gunman was barricaded and where the gunman’s car was in relation to the club.  He went to his vehicle to retrieve his tactical gear.  He heard an explosion which he later learned was an attempt to breach the club wall.  Explosive breaching is when SWAT uses controlled explosives to enter a structure, in this case the West wall of the club between bathrooms.  The explosion created a small portal and victims were quickly being extricated and being patted down for weapons or possible bobby traps.  People were assessed for injuries for about 10 minutes before gun shots were heard from inside the club.  SWAT threw in flash points and then shot Mateen.

Mateen’s vehicle was inspected for bombs.  All that was found was ammunition. A van that size could have held 1,000 pounds of explosives which would have devastated the entire club and surrounding area.  When they saw Omar’s downed body, they saw what appeared to be wires beneath his pant legs.  They could be part of an IED (Improvised Explosive Device.) All living victims had to be removed from the club before a robot could remotely inspect the body. Three robots were used to inspect the club and the car before officers could approach.  Mateen had fallen down onto an exit sign, the wires were not part of a bomb.   The robots manipulated the gunman’s body.  Images of his body were flashed on the courtroom computer screens.  Noor Salman never glanced at the screen choosing instead to write on her yellow legal pad.  The purpose of the video and photos was to show the extremity of the situation and to show that the actions of the Fort Pierce police were justified.

The judge insisted that any evidence showing victims would have to be redacted before it could be submitted as evidence. No evidence was suppressed during this morning session. Judge Byron called for a lunch break.