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RIVERSIDE, Calif. (AP) —
Less than a month before his friend carried out the San Bernardino terror attack, the man who authorities say bought the assault rifles used in the massacre wondered when the multiple lives he was leading would come crashing down.
"Involved in terrorist plots, drugs, anti-social behavior, marriage, might go to prison for fraud, etc," Enrique Marquez Jr. told someone in a Facebook chat Nov. 5.
The posting, described in court documents, foreshadowed trouble he was facing before any bullets started flying.
Now Marquez stands accused of terrorism-related charges and other counts linked to the San Bernardino shootings.
Marquez, 24, was charged Thursday with conspiring to provide material support to terrorists in deadly plots with Syed Rizwan Farook in 2011 and 2012 that they never carried out.
The duo, who had become adherents to radicalized Islam ideology as neighbors in Riverside, wanted to maximize carnage by using pipe bombs and guns to kill innocent people at a campus cafeteria and those stuck in rush hour traffic, court documents said.
Those plans may never have come to light if not for the attack where Farook and his wife, Tashfeen Malik, used guns Marquez bought years ago to kill 14 people and wound 22 at a holiday meeting of Farook's health department co-workers.
The FBI has labeled the shootings terrorism, making it the deadliest strike by Islamic extremists on American soil since Sept. 11, 2001.
Marquez was charged with illegally purchasing the rifles that the shooters used in the slaughter and were found with hours later after dying in a gun battle with police.
In his initial court appearance, Marquez looked disheveled. His short hair flopped over his forehead, there was stubble on his face, and the pockets of his black pants were turned out. He appeared calm and showed no emotion as he gave one-word answers to the judge.
No plea was entered and he was ordered held until a bail hearing Monday in U.S. District Court. If convicted of all three counts, he could face up to 35 years in federal prison.
His public defender declined comment, though friends and family have described him as a good person who was easygoing and liked to party.
Marquez, a former licensed security guard, was working at a Riverside bar at the time of the shooting and is not alleged to have had a role in the attack.
But prosecutors said he was linked to the killings by the guns and explosive materials he bought years earlier. The couple used that material in a remote-controlled pipe bomb that never detonated at the conference room where the shootings occurred.
"His prior purchase of the firearms and ongoing failure to warn authorities about Farook's intent to commit mass murder had fatal consequences," U.S. Attorney Eileen Decker said.
A lengthy affidavit by FBI special agent Joel Anderson outlines evidence against Marquez, including statements he gave investigators over 11 days after he waived his rights to remain silent and be represented by a lawyer.
Attorney E. Martin Estrada, a former federal prosecutor in Los Angeles, said the admissibility of Marquez's statements to the FBI will likely be challenged by defense lawyers, but if the statements are allowed in court, they give prosecutors a very strong case because of corroborating evidence.
"This wasn't a conversation with an average Joe," Estrada said. "This was a conversation with a person that was capable and had the capacity and the intent to commit mass murder. That's pretty chilling."
The affidavit said Marquez called 911 hours after the attack to say his neighbor had used his gun in the shooting, using an expletive to describe Farook.
Marquez then showed up agitated at a hospital emergency room, saying he had downed nine beers and was "involved" in the shooting. He was involuntarily committed to a psychiatric ward.
Marquez lived next door to Farook, 28, who introduced him to Islam 10 years ago. Marquez told authorities he converted to Islam around age 16 and four years later was spending most of his time at Farook's home, reading, listening to and watching "radical Islamic content" that included al-Qaida instructions on how to make bombs.
Four years ago, Marquez said, he and Farook planned to toss pipe bombs into the cafeteria at Riverside City College and then shoot people as they fled.
They also planned to throw pipe bombs on a busy section of freeway that has no exits, bringing traffic to a halt and then picking off motorists. Marquez would shoot from a nearby hillside, targeting police, as Farook fired at drivers from the road.
As part of the plan, Marquez bought two assault rifles — in November 2011 and February 2012. He said he agreed to buy them because "Farook looked Middle Eastern."
Authorities previously said Marquez had legally purchased the guns Farook and Malik used. But the charges allege that Marquez lied by signing paperwork that said the guns were for himself or a family member.
The FBI has said Farook and Malik, 29, were radicalized before they met online in 2013, but the court documents show Farook had considered violent plots much earlier.
Marquez said he and Farook aborted their plans after authorities interrupted a terror plot in the area in November 2012 that involved four men who planned to join either the Taliban or al-Qaida fighting U.S. forces overseas.
He said they didn't see much of each other after it unraveled, though he deepened his connection with the Farook family, marrying the Russian sister of the wife of Farook's brother last year.
Prosecutors said it was a sham marriage to help the woman obtain U.S. residency.
According to the affidavit, Marquez was paid $200 per month for the union and said his own mother and brother didn't know about it.
When his mother visited him at the hospital two days later after the shootings, her son again referred to Syed Rizwan Farook by an expletive and said he did not know "he was going to do that," Anderson said in the affidavit. Marquez also said he no longer wanted Farook as a friend.
TRENTON, N.J. (AP) —
The pharmaceutical executive reviled for price-gouging resigned Friday as head of the drugmaker Turing Pharmaceuticals, a day after being arrested on charges of securities fraud related to a company he previously ran.
Martin Shkreli, whose arrest delighted countless people appalled by his unapologetic stance after hiking the price of a life-saving drug by 5,000 percent, is being replaced on an interim basis by Ron Tilles, according to a statement issued Friday by Turing, which is privately held.
Tilles has been chairman of Turing's board of directors since the company was founded late last year. Turing said that Tilles will continue to hold the board chairman position as well. He has worked at numerous private equity and venture capital firms in the pharmaceutical and medical device industries over the last two decades.
Turing also issued a statement that business would continue as usual and that no patient would be denied access to Daraprim, the drug whose price hike made Shkreli a pariah to both patients and other pharmaceutical companies.
Turing also said it was sending a similarly worded letter to doctors stressing that it will continue to offer financial assistance to eligible patients needing Daraprim who are either uninsured or have commercial insurance. Medicare patients are being referred to a charity for help.
Shkreli, a 32-year-old former hedge fund manager, has become the "most hated man in America," according to some headline writers, for jacking up the price of Daraprim, the only approved drug for toxoplasmosis, a life-threatening parasitic infection that mainly strikes pregnant women, cancer patients and AIDS patients, from $13.50 to $750 per pill. He did so this fall, shortly after Turing acquired rights to sell the pill in the U.S., paying another company $55 million for it.
Amid a deluge of criticism from patients and politicians, Shkreli pledged to lower Daraprim's price, but later reneged and instead offered hospitals a 50 percent discount — still amounting to a 2,500 percent increase. Patients normally take most of the weeks' long treatment after returning home, so they and their insurer still face the $750-a-pill price.
On Thursday, federal prosecutors said that between 2009 and 2014, Shkreli lost some of his hedge fund investors' money through bad trades, then looted Retrophin, a pharmaceutical company where he was CEO, for $11 million to pay back his disgruntled clients. Shkreli founded the company early in 2011 and was sued by Retrophin and fired last fall after his alleged misappropriations were revealed.
Shkreli, a flagrant self-promoter who recently said he should have hiked the price of Daraprim even more, was paraded in handcuffs by the FBI after his arrest. Photos of him, wearing a gray hoodie as he was escorted by authorities, spread on the Internet like wildfire, generating social media posts celebrating his apparent fall. The news — unrelated to his actions at Turing — delighted patients, advocacy groups and average Joes who found his price-gouging despicable.
Shkreli pleaded not guilty to charges of securities fraud and conspiracy, which carry a sentence of up to 20 years in prison if he's convicted. He was released on $5 million bail.
He later posted on his Twitter account: "Glad to be home. Thanks for the support."
Turing, which has offices in New York and Zug, Switzerland, said Tilles has worked with several securities firms, starting with Merrill Lynch in 1985.
In the company's statement, Tilles said he's excited by the chance to guide Turing and that it's "committed to ensuring that all patients have ready and affordable access to Daraprim" and a second drug, Vecamyl, a pill for treating high blood pressure.
Tilles also thanked Shkreli "for helping us build Turing Pharmaceuticals into the dynamic research-focused company it is today," a reference to Shkreli's after-the-fact claim that he needed to raise Daraprim's price so much to fund research on other drugs.
Shkreli recently became the CEO of a second company, KaloBios Pharmaceuticals, Inc., based in South San Francisco, California. There's no word yet on whether he'll remain at the helm there.
KaloBios had announced plans to stop research programs on two drugs and shut down the company shortly before Shkreli and an invested group swooped in on Nov. 19, bought 70 percent of its shares and promised a $3 million stock investment and $10 million in financing. Shkreli was named CEO and board chairman the same day, and KaloBios shares zoomed from $2.07 to $39.50 within days.
Trading in KaloBios shares was halted early Thursday,after Shkreli's arrest, and hasn't resumed. Their price fell to $23.59 .
WASHINGTON (AP) —
Closing out a tumultuous year, President Barack Obama laid the groundwork Friday for his last year in office, vowing not to fade into the background but instead use his remaining months to push longstanding goals to fruition.
"In 2016, I'm going to leave it all out on the field," he said. "Wherever there's an opportunity, I'm going to take it."
In his annual year-end news conference, Obama portrayed 2015 as one of significant progress for his agenda, pointing to diplomacy with Iran and Cuba and an Asia-Pacific trade agreement as big wins for his administration. He also praised a Supreme Court ruling legalizing gay marriage and a congressional rewrite of the No Child Left Behind law as further victories for causes he's made central to his presidency.
Still, he said, he plans to do much more in 2016.
"I said at the beginning of this year that interesting stuff happens in the fourth quarter — and we are only halfway through," Obama said.
Calling attention to his signature legislative achievement, Obama announced that 6 million people had signed up for health care so far this year under the Affordable Care Act, a surge that officials say illustrates the program's durability.
After the news conference, Obama was to depart for San Bernardino, California, where he planned to meet with families of the 14 victims of the recent mass shooting. He then will fly to Hawaii where he'll spend two weeks on vacation with his wife and daughters in what has become a family Christmas tradition.
Hours before his departure, Congress passed a major bipartisan budget package that staved off a potential government shutdown and extended tax cuts for both families and businesses. The White House has indicated Obama will sign it.
Crediting lawmakers with ending the year on a "high note," Obama offered rare if muted praise for a Congress that more often than not has obstructed his legislative agenda. He said he'd called new House Speaker Paul Ryan to thank him for "orderly negotiations," describing the Wisconsin Republican as professional and straightforward.
"Kudos to him," Obama said.
The president noted optimistically that by averting a funding crisis for the next nine months, Congress had cleared a path for cooperation with him next year on areas of common ground. He pointed to a potential criminal justice overhaul and congressional consideration of the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade pact as areas ripe for cooperation.
"Congress and I have a long runway to get some things done for the American people," he said.
Obama took questions as he closed out a turbulent year marked by successes on restoring diplomatic relations with Cuba, clinching a nuclear deal with Iran and finalizing an unprecedented global climate treaty. Those successes have been tempered by a lack of progress on the president's other priorities, like closing the Guantanamo Bay detention center.
Obama said he'd present a long-delayed plan to close the prison to Congress early next year, then wait for lawmakers' reaction before determining whether to take action on his own to shut it. He predicted the prison population would dwindle by early next year to less than 100, a threshold his administration has been pushing for to bolster its argument that keeping the facility open isn't cost effective.
Amid widespread fears about terrorism and extremists, Obama pushed back against critics questioning his strategy for overcoming the Islamic State group in Iraq and Syria. "There's only so much bombing you can do," he said, though he insisted anew, "We're going to defeat ISIS."
He also affirmed his longstanding position that Syrian President Bashar Assad must leave power for Syria to resolve its civil war, even though his administration has recently said it could accept an unspecified transition period during which Assad stayed.
Still, Obama contended about Syria, "Five years later, I was right."
The end of 2015 marks a major transition point for the president, who has one year left to try to finish as many of his projects as possible. He won't be rolling out sweeping new policy proposals that would be unlikely to get serious consideration amid the focus on electing his successor. The White House is promising Obama will deliver a "non-traditional" State of the Union address in January laying out an agenda that includes further executive steps on climate change and gun control.
Obama plans to return to the White House in early January to begin a final year in office that will be increasingly overshadowed by the 2016 presidential campaign. Predicting success for his party, Obama said he was confident Democrats would nominate a strong candidate to replace him.
"I think I will have a Democratic successor," Obama said. "And I will campaign very hard to make that happen."