CNN: NYC Hatchet Attack Suspect's Facebook Page Indicates Extremist Views

CNN: NYC Hatchet Attack Suspect's Facebook Page Indicates Extremist Views

Thursday night on CNN’s “OutFront with Erin Burnett,” Burnett reported that an incident earlier in the day in which a man allegedly attacked two NYPD officers with a hatchet, critically wounding one of the officers, has investigators concerned it was a terrorist attack.

“Investigators fear this may have been a terrorist attack,” Burnett said. “New York City Police Commissioner Bill Bratton just addressed that.”

“I think certainly the heightened concerns relative to that type of assault based on what just happened in Canada and recent events in Israel…” the police commissioner said in a press conference a short time earlier.

CNN chief national security correspondent Jim Sciutto appeared to give an update on the attacks.

“What’s concerning New York police is what’s on his Facebook page, things indicating extremist views,” Sciutto said. “As a result of this attack, especially following the attack in Canada yesterday, they have since issued a bulletin advising New York City police officers to have increased situational awareness for attacks like this.”

“This is really the kind of scenario, lone wolf attacks like the one we saw in Canada, very difficult to predict, and it doesn’t take much to carry one of these out. It just takes one person with extremist views, a simple weapon, in this case a hatchet, manages to wound two police officers before they were able to kill him, but right in broad daylight in New York City streets, and again, it’s what they see on his Facebook page that’s concerning them about extremist views, it’s why they are suspecting that there might be an extremist motivation for this.”

Follow Daniel Nussbaum at Twitter @NussBB

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