This undated image shows Omar Mateen, who authorities say killed dozens of people inside the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Fla., on Sunday, June 12, 2016. The gunman opened fire inside the crowded gay nightclub... (Associated Press) 
 
 FORT PIERCE, Fla. (AP) — Like many other young American men, Omar Mateen worked a series of unremarkable jobs during and after high school — a Publix grocery store, Circuit City, Chick-Fil-A and Walgreens. 
 
 He graduated in 2003 and jumped through a series of jobs related to nutrition and health, working at Nutrition World, Gold's Gym and a GNC store. 
 
 He worked for six months at a state prison. And an early marriage faltered. 
 
 But eventually he found some form of stability with a job as a security guard in South Florida, where he was still working when he stormed a gay nightclub early Sunday in Orlando, resulting in the deaths of 49 people and the wounding of 53 more. He died in a gunfight with police. 
 
 It remained unclear exactly why Mateen targeted the club. However, one patron told The Orlando Sentinel he saw Mateen drinking at the bar several times before the shooting. Ty Smith said he saw Mateen inside at least a dozen times. 
 
 "Sometimes he would go over in the corner and sit and drink by himself, and other times he would get so drunk he was loud and belligerent," Smith said. 
 
 Mateen, 29, spent most of his childhood on Florida's Atlantic coast and lived there as an adult, not far from his parents. Born in the New York City borough of Queens in 1986, he moved with his family to the Long Island town of Westbury two years later and then in 1991 to Port Saint Lucie, Florida, about 125 miles southeast of Orlando. 
 
 Imam Syed Shafeeq Rahman of the city's Islamic Center said he knew Mateen and his family since the shooter was a boy and never saw any signs of violence in him. The Orlando attack, he said, "was totally unexpected." 
 
 But one colleague at the security contractor G4S, his most recent employer, remembered the son of Afghan immigrants as an angry, profane co-worker who used slurs and threatened violence. 
 
 Daniel Gilroy said Mateen started badgering him and sending dozens of text messages to him daily, and that he reported Mateen's behavior to his bosses. 
 
 "I kind of feel a little guilty that I didn't fight harder," Gilroy said. "If I didn't walk away and I fought, then maybe 50 people would still be alive today." 
 
 Gilroy told multiple news outlets that Mateen routinely used slurs for gay people, blacks, Jews and women. 
 
 "He talked about killing people all the time," Gilroy told The New York Times. Of the massacre, Gilroy said, "I saw it coming." 
 
 G4S denied Gilroy's claims, saying in a statement Monday that it had no record of Gilroy ever making such a complaint to his superiors. Furthermore, the company said, Gilroy told officials shortly after leaving in June 2015: "The work and job assignments were respectful and co-workers were good men and women that put in an honest day's work and genuinely like to work as a team and contribute." 
 
 A woman who said she was once a neighbor of Mateen's said the security company assigned him to guard the back entrance of PGA Village, a golf resort in Port St. Lucie. Tricia Adorno said her children would sometimes play ball with Mateen's young son. 
 
 A spokesman for the St. Lucie County clerk of court said Mateen had once been assigned to the clerk's building and was issued a credential. Joseph Abreu said Mateen last used the credential to access the building in May 2013. 
 
 In a statement, G4S said Mateen had been subject to a detailed screening when he was recruited in 2007 and was re-screened in 2013 "with no adverse findings." 
 
 Mateen graduated with a degree in criminal-justice technology from Indian River Community College in 2006, the same year he changed his name from Omar Mir Seddique to Omar Mir Seddique Mateen, according to civil court records in St. Lucie County. The papers listed no reason for the name change. 
 
 His ex-wife, Sitora Yusufiy, said her former husband wanted to be a police officer and had applied to the police academy. 
 
 Florida Department of Corrections spokesman Alberto Moscoso said Mateen had worked at the Martin Correctional Institution in Indiantown, Florida, from Oct. 27, 2006, to April 27, 2007. 
 
 In September 2007, he was hired by G4S, a global security firm that has 610,000 employees in about 100 countries. 
 
 Yusufiy told reporters in Boulder, Colorado, that she believed Mateen suffered from mental illness. 
 
 Although records show the couple didn't divorce for two years after their 2009 marriage, Yusiufiy said she was actually with Mateen for only four months because he was abusive. She said he would not let her speak to her family and that family members had to come literally pull her out of his arms. 
 
 Divorce papers reveal that Mateen made $1,600 a month working for G4S and that she earned $3,000 a month as a real estate agent. 
 
 It's unclear when Mateen married his second wife, Noor Salman, but an Aug. 30, 2013, property deed in Saint Lucie County identified them as a married couple. 
 
 Family members said the pair had a young son about 3 years old. 
 
 On Monday, the FBI said Mateen appeared to be a "homegrown extremist" who espoused support for a jumble of often-conflicting Islamic radical groups. During the attack, he called 911 to profess allegiance to the Islamic State group. 
 
 FBI Director James Comey said Mateen was clearly "radicalized," at least in part via the internet. 
 
 The FBI became aware of him in 2013 when co-workers reported that he claimed to have family connections to al-Qaida and to be a member of Hezbollah, too, Comey said. 
 
 The agency launched a 10-month preliminary investigation, following Mateen, reviewing his communications and questioning him, the FBI chief said. Mateen claimed he made the remarks in anger because co-workers were teasing him and discriminating against him as a Muslim. The FBI eventually closed the case, Comey said. 
 
 His name surfaced again as part of another investigation into a suicide bomber from the Syrian rebel group Nusra Front. The FBI found Mateen and the man had attended the same mosque and knew each other casually, but the investigation turned up "no ties of any consequence," Comey said. 
 
 Mateen purchased at least two firearms legally within the last week or so, according to Trevor Velinor of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. 
 
 He attended evening prayer services at Port St. Lucie's Islamic Center three to four times a week, most recently with his son, Rahman said. The imam said he last saw Mateen on Friday. 
 
 "When he finished prayer, he would just leave," Rahman told The Associated Press. "He would not socialize with anybody. He would be quiet. He would be very peaceful." 
 
 On Monday, the shooter's father, Seddique Mir Mateen, said what his son did "was the act of a terrorist." 
 
 "I apologize for what my son did. I am as sad and mad as you guys are," he told reporters outside his home. He did not go into details about his son's religious or political views, insisting he did not know. 
 
 Asked whether he missed his son, the father said: "I don't miss anything about him. What he did was against humanity." 
 
 ___ 
 
 Weiss reported from Charlotte, North Carolina. AP writer Brendan Farrington contributed to this report. 
 
 ___ 
 
 This story has been corrected to show that Gilroy, not Mateen, made the statement to the company about respectful workers. ||||| Omar Mateen was a loner who went from job to job, had few friends, a failed marriage, a demanding father and a history of bragging about ties to radical Islamic militant groups. 
 
 As a teenager in high school, he cheered the 9/11 terrorists and claimed that his uncle was Osama bin Laden, according to classmates. He told friends bin Laden had taught him how to shoot an AK-47 and that, on the day of the attacks, he pretended he was an airplane striking a wall, as if mimicking the World Trade Center strikes. 
 
 But as a young adult, Mateen finally seemed headed in a positive direction, earning a college degree in criminal justice technology. He was hired by the Florida Department of Corrections, where he hoped he would receive training to become a certified police officer. 
 
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 SHARE COPY LINK FBI Director James Comey talked about the bureau's initial investigation of Omar Mateen, who later killed at least 49 people at Pulse night club in Orlando, Florida. He said the gunman showed "strong indications of radicalization" before the mass 
 
 As federal investigators began to piece together the 29-year-old’s descent into terrorism — and uncover a motive for his killing spree in Orlando — friends, co-workers, schoolmates and neighbors who knew him and his family gave differing and sometimes conflicting accounts of his behavior. 
 
 It’s remained unclear what role, if any, his father, Seddique Mateen, played in shaping his beliefs. The elder Mateen, a licensed insurance broker who lives in Port St. Lucie, is a native of Afghanistan who espouses support for the Taliban and, in the past, publicly denounced U.S. support for Pakistan. 
 
 On Monday, the 59-year-old father invited reporters into his home in groups and reiterated that his son never showed signs that he was troubled, nor any indication that he was influenced by radical Islamic terrorist groups. 
 
 He expressed anger and disappointment that his son seemed unable to live up to his expectations. 
 
 “I don’t forgive him as a father. Instead of doing this, he should have gone and gotten a better education,” Seddique Mateen said, sitting on a couch in his living room in Port St. Lucie, a photograph of his son as a young boy on the couch beside him. 
 
 SHARE COPY LINK Seddique Mateen, the father of Pulse nightclub shooter Omar Mateen, speaks with the media from his home on Mon., June 13, 2016 about Sunday's massacre. 
 
 His father condemned the massacre but continued to insist that it was motivated by his son’s hatred of gays, not by his Muslim faith or the Islamic State, which claimed Mateen was one of their “soldiers,” though there is no evidence IS knew about the slaughter beforehand. 
 
 Asked about his own political leanings, the elder Mateen brushed off questions about his support for the Taliban. For several years, he hosted a satellite TV show out of California in which he declared himself the president of his homeland. He also formed a nonprofit charity that supports the Taliban, records show. 
 
 It’s not known whether his son — or his two daughters — shared his political activism, but federal authorities searched the father’s Port St. Lucie home on Sunday and seized his computer and other items. 
 
 Omar stood up in class ... and he started jumping up and down cheering on the terrorists. posting on Facebook by a former classmate 
 
 They also raided Omar Mateen’s condo in Fort Pierce, where he lived with his wife and 3-year-old son. His wife, Noor Zahi Salman, was interviewed by the FBI on Monday but — unlike Mateen’s first wife, who claimed that Mateen beat her — Salman has not spoken publicly. 
 
 Neighbors of the couple said Omar Mateen rarely spoke, even when he was spoken to. 
 
 “If you tried to speak to him, he would just look at you like you were crazy,” said neighbor Jason Beers. 
 
 Court records released Monday show that Mateen held a series of jobs in high school and college, never working more than a year at any one place. 
 
 SHARE COPY LINK Weapons purchased at the gun shop were used to massacre 49 people in an Orlando club Sunday morning. The owner said the ATF confirmed the store was in compliance with gun sales law and regulations. The owner spoke to the media on Mon., June 13, 20 
 
 High school friends recalled that on the day of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, Mateen’s behavior was particularly alarming — and frightening. 
 
 “Omar stood up in class … and he started jumping up and down cheering on the terrorists,” a former classmate wrote on Facebook. 
 
 Another former classmate who spoke to the Miami Herald confirmed that Mateen “started acting crazy” the day of the Sept. 11, 2001, World Trade Center attacks. At one point, he stood up in class and announced that his uncle was Osama bin Laden and how bin Laden had taught him how to shoot an assault rifle, said the former classmate, who wanted only his first name, Michael, used. 
 
 Michael said Mateen was pulled out of class and his father was called. When the elder Mateen arrived, he slapped his son across the face in front of other students, Michael said. 
 
 Robert Zirkle, 29, who rode the school bus with Mateen, said that on the bus later that week Mateen extended his arms to mimic an airplane and “he would just act like he hit a wall, kind of lean forward and back and make an explosion sound or screaming sounds.” 
 
 Zirkle said Mateen was expelled shortly afterward. 
 
 Marty Bielicki, a former dean of students at Martin County High School, wrote on social media that Mateen had been in and out of trouble. “Clearly, if his employer had access to his juvenile record, he would be the last person to own a weapon,” Bielicki wrote. 
 
 SHARE COPY LINK Snapchat video sent to a friend of Amanda Alvear, who was at Pulse nightclub when the gunshots rang out, the night of the attack. Alvear died in the shooting. 
 
 While in college, the younger Mateen legally changed his name from Omar Mir Seddique to Omar Mir Seddique Mateen. In the application papers, he said he was born in New Hyde Park, N.Y., and lived in Flushing and Westbury, N.Y., before moving with his family to Port St. Lucie in 1991. 
 
 Vinnie Krestalude lived next door to Omar Mateen’s family in Port St. Lucie between 1998 and 2000, when Mateen was a teenager. He said Mateen’s father was involved in numerous neighborhood feuds, including arguments with Krestalude’s father. 
 
 Krestalude said the police came to the house several times to settle the disputes, which were mainly neighborhood nuisance-type calls. The Mateens moved before the 9/11 attacks, but the Krestaludes called police afterward, reporting that in hindsight they feared the family’s activities were suspicious. Police said they investigated and didn’t find anything nefarious. 
 
 “We always felt that there was something more to it just because of the hatred and the hostility in the man’s eyes,” Krestalude recalled, referring to the elder Mateen. 
 
 SHARE COPY LINK Families of victims of the shooting at Pulse nightclub gathered at the Beardall Senior Center in Orlando to get information on their missing loved ones on Mon., June 13, 2016. (Editor's note: Esmeralda Leal later found out that her son was one of 
 
 But Mike Mazzone, who lived across the street from the Mateens in Port St. Lucie for several years, remembered the family as neighborly and kind, although he said he didn’t know them well. 
 
 He said the elder Mateen once replaced tiles that had come loose from his roof after a storm. And Omar, who was looking for work after college, helped him jump-start his Toyota RAV4 when the battery died. Omar’s mother, Shahla, invited him to the back patio for a homemade dish of rice and vegetables. 
 
 “They were lovely people,” he said. “Sometimes you can live with someone and not know who they are.” 
 
 But after college, Omar Mateen’s dreams of becoming a police officer were thwarted when he failed to pass his probationary employment period at Martin County Correctional Institution, a state prison in Indiantown where he worked as a trainee officer for six months until he was let go in 2007. It’s not clear why he was dismissed. The Florida Department of Corrections did not release his employment record on Monday. 
 
 Mateen was then hired by G4S, the largest security company in the world, and he passed a background check and clearance to become an armed security guard. He was assigned to the St. Lucie courthouse in 2013, when he first came to the attention of the FBI after he allegedly told co-workers he had connections to the terrorist group al-Qaeda. 
 
 The case was closed by the FBI following a 10-month investigation. 
 
 Caitlin Kelly, who worked with Mateen at G4S in 2004 and 2005, said she reconnected with him last October on the dating website PlentyOfFish. 
 
 After talking on the phone for several months, Mateen came over to Kelly’s home one night a few months ago, she said. He claimed he was having “baby mama drama” problems with the mother of his son and never told Kelly he was married. 
 
 He pressured her to have an intimate relationship, but she said she had a bad feeling about him. 
 
 “You knew it was a loose screw, but you didn’t know which screw it was,” she said. ||||| Orlando man recognized gunman from gay dating apps copied! 
 
 Cord Cedeno, who frequents Pulse nightclub and lost friends there, recognized the gunman from his photos as someone who had messaged him on a gay dating app. 
 
 Read More ||||| On a quiet street in Rodeo, about 45 minutes from San Francisco, residents were shocked to hear that their neighbor was the shooter's mother-in-law. (Published Monday, June 13, 2016) 
 
 On a quiet street in Rodeo, about 45 minutes from San Francisco, residents were shocked to learn their neighbor was the mother-in-law of the man who opened fire inside an Orlando nightclub early Sunday, killing 49 people in the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history. 
 
 Many learned the news from reporters who camped out up and down the broad suburban street on Sunday night: Their neighbor, Ekbal Zahi Salman, a widow and mother of four daughters, was linked to gunman Omar Mateen. 
 
 "[The shooter] was married to her daughter. I was surprised. It was a shock. Nobody can imagine that," said Rajinder Chahal, who lives across the street from Salman. "Yesterday my wife talked to her. She was weeping." 
 
 The profile picture from the Facebook Page for Noor Zahi Salman aka Noor Mateen, identifed by a friend as the wife of the shooter. 
 
 Photo credit: facebook 
 
 Neighbors said Salman had four daughters, didn't speak English very well and lost her husband a few years ago. All described her as kind and normal. 
 
 They said her eldest daughter Noor Salman married Mateen and moved to Florida about five years ago. 
 
 Simrat Chahal, 19, said his mother and grandmother sometimes chatted with their neighbor across the street. 
 
 "I find it really disturbing," said Chahal. "I actually didn't expect it from their family, you know? I'm not saying that that was their intentions too. But it just so happens to be that they're involved and that's tough on them." 
 
 His grandmother, Sarwan Kaur, said Ekbal Zahi Salman cried as she complained to her neighbors that Mateen wouldn't let her eldest daughter visit her. 
 
 "Like, even when she was in the hospital, her husband wouldn't let her come see her own mother," Chahal said. 
 
 'She's a Very Sweet Girl:' Orlando Shooter’s 2nd Wife Grew Up in the Bay Area 
 
 'She's a Very Sweet Girl:' Orlando Shooter’s 2nd Wife Grew Up in the Bay Area (Published Monday, June 13, 2016) 
 
 Kaur, who hails from India's Punjab region, spoke in Punjabi about her friendship with Ekbal Zahi Salman, which began 17 years ago when she first moved across the street. 
 
 "We were friends from the very beginning," she said. "The girls were all very nice; I watched them grow up. Noor is a very nice and sweet girl." 
 
 Despite the language barrier, the Kaur and Ekbal Zahi Salman grew close, visiting each other acros the street, Kaur said. 
 
 "I don’t know English, so it was more like, 'Hi, Hi, Bye, Bye,'" she said. "But Ekbal and I chatted quite often. She would never eat anything in my house because we have a dog." 
 
 Kaur said Ekbal Zahi Salman’s husband died of a heart attack about 10 years ago. She said the Salman girls were close to their father, whom she also described as a nice man. 
 
 The couple’s youngest daughter, who is 14, lives with her mother, according to Kaur. 
 
 "The rest are all married and live with their husbands," she said, adding that it had been a while since she'd seen Noor Salman, who married Mateen in a Muslim wedding. 
 
 Kaur said she had rarely discussed Mateen with Ekbal Zahi Salman. 
 
 She remembers seeing her friend for the last time the day before the shooting. 
 
 "Her blinds have been drawn since then, I haven’t seen anyone," she said. "Ekbal never goes anywhere … Sometimes I’ll see her when her girls come over." ||||| FORT PIERCE — At least four regular customers at the Orlando gay nightclub where a gunman killed 49 people said Monday that they had seen Omar Mateen there before. 
 
 "Sometimes he would go over in the corner and sit and drink by himself, and other times he would get so drunk he was loud and belligerent," Ty Smith said. 
 
 More details emerged Monday about the 29-year-old gunman and what he did in the days leading up to the massacre, the deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history. 
 
 He was at Walt Disney World in April, said a Disney manager who requested anonymity. 
 
 FBI Director James Comey said his agency was trying to nail down that report and the possibility that Mateen was scouting the amusement park as a potential target, the Associated Press reported. 
 
 CAPTION The report said OPD policy and procedures were followed, but the protective plan “was not written with an attack of this magnitude in mind.” The report said OPD policy and procedures were followed, but the protective plan “was not written with an attack of this magnitude in mind.” CAPTION The report said OPD policy and procedures were followed, but the protective plan “was not written with an attack of this magnitude in mind.” The report said OPD policy and procedures were followed, but the protective plan “was not written with an attack of this magnitude in mind.” CAPTION The owner of Pulse nightclub, Barbara Poma spoke at a ceremony honoring the 49 people lost in Pulse massacre. The owner of Pulse nightclub, Barbara Poma spoke at a ceremony honoring the 49 people lost in Pulse massacre. CAPTION Barbara Poma, founder of the onePULSE Foundation and former owner of the Pulse nightclub, reflects on the second anniversary of the Pulse massacre, Monday, June 11, 2018. (Joe Burbank/Orlando Sentinel) Barbara Poma, founder of the onePULSE Foundation and former owner of the Pulse nightclub, reflects on the second anniversary of the Pulse massacre, Monday, June 11, 2018. (Joe Burbank/Orlando Sentinel) CAPTION Pulse related events around Orlando are scheduled Monday and Tuesday to honor the victims of the mass shooting on June 12, 2016. Pulse related events around Orlando are scheduled Monday and Tuesday to honor the victims of the mass shooting on June 12, 2016. CAPTION Two years after a gunman killed 49 people at Orlando's Pulse nightclub, the city has more metal detectors, panic buttons, active-shooter drills, trauma counseling and grief-stricken parents and partners than it did in 2016. But for some, it also has more compassion and progress and purpose. Two years after a gunman killed 49 people at Orlando's Pulse nightclub, the city has more metal detectors, panic buttons, active-shooter drills, trauma counseling and grief-stricken parents and partners than it did in 2016. But for some, it also has more compassion and progress and purpose. 
 
 Smith told the Orlando Sentinel that he saw Mateen inside at least a dozen times. 
 
 "We didn't really talk to him a lot, but I remember him saying things about his dad at times," Smith said. "He told us he had a wife and child." 
 
 When asked about those sightings, Orlando Police Chief John Mina said he had no information. 
 
 Another Pulse regular, Kevin West, told the Los Angeles Times that Mateen messaged him on and off for a year using a gay chat app. 
 
 They had never met, West said, but he watched as Mateen entered the club about 1 a.m. Sunday, an hour before the shooting began. 
 
 Mateen was the security guard, born in New Hyde Park, NY., who walked into the club about 2 a.m. Sunday with a semiautomatic pistol and an assault rifle. While dance music blared, he opened fire, killing 49 people and injuring 53. 
 
 He died three hours later in a shootout with the Orlando Police Department SWAT team when it stormed the building. 
 
 During the standoff, Mateen proclaimed his allegiance to the Islamic State and his support for the Muslim brothers who set off two bombs at the 2013 Boston Marathon, police said. 
 
 Late Monday came word that Mateen's wife, Noor Zahi Salman, was not cooperating with authorities, according to a law enforcement official who spoke on the condition of anonymity. 
 
 Investigators want to ask if she knew about his plans in advance or helped him scout out targets. 
 
 The official said they have talked extensively with Mateen's ex-wife, Sitora Yusufiy, who told reporters Sunday that the gunman was bi-polar and sometimes violent. 
 
 Mateen bought the weapons he used — a 9-mm semiautomatic pistol and .223-caliber assault rifle — at St. Lucie Shooting Center a few days before the massacre. Owner Edward Henson on Monday said he "vaguely" remembered him. 
 
 "He's a nobody," said Henson. "He's a customer. He came and purchased his guns, and he left." 
 
 Although the FBI investigated Mateen for possible connections to Muslim terrorists in 2013 and 2014, they closed those cases, concluding he was not a threat, Comey said. 
 
 Nothing in Mateen's background prohibited him from legally buying those guns, and the head of the state agency that oversees gun permits in Florida told reporters Monday that the system worked the way it was designed, The News Service of Florida reported. 
 
 Mateen applied for a state security guard license, the type that allows the holder to carry a firearm, and he got one, said Adam Putnam, state agriculture commissioner. Mateen was a U.S. citizen, had no criminal record and passed a psychological test. 
 
 He was eligible to buy as many guns as he liked because he was not a convicted felon, and was not facing a felony charge or a misdemeanor domestic violence charge. He was not a drug abuser, a fugitive, the subject of a domestic violence injunction, someone who was in the country illegally, someone who had been dishonorably discharged from the military or someone who had been found by a judge to be mentally incompetent. 
 
 "You cannot be deprived of rights because of an accusation," said Eileen Rieg, a former gun shop owner in Orlando who now operates a security guard training company. She said she was troubled that the FBI had not earlier found enough evidence to make an arrest. 
 
 More details emerged Monday, too, about Mateen's background, much of it related to law enforcement. 
 
 When he was 19, Mateen was injured when a St. Lucie County Sheriff's deputy lost control of his cruiser while racing to the scene of an automobile crash, according to a report. 
 
 Mateen was a passenger in the patrol car, taking part in a citizen ride-along, according to Sheriff's Office spokesman Bryan Beaty. 
 
 In 2006 he worked at a state prison — Martin Correctional Institution in Indiantown — for six months, according to Florida Department of Corrections. 
 
 That same year, he earned an associate's degree in criminal justice from Indian River Community College, according to school spokesman Robert Lane. That's a degree required to become a law enforcement officer in Florida. 
 
 In 2007, he was hired by G4S, a private security firm based in Jupiter. His assignment at the time of his death: working as a security guard at a gated retirement community in South Florida, the company reported. 
 
 Before that, G4S assigned him, for a time, to the St. Lucie County Courthouse in Fort Pierce, a gig that ended in 2013, according to court Administrator Thomas Genung. 
 
 Cord Cedeno and Chris Callen are other Pulse customers who told the Sentinel they had seen Mateen in the nightclub. 
 
 Callen said he had witnessed violent outbursts by Mateen. 
 
 "It was definitely him. He'd come in for years, and people knew him," Cedeno said. 
 
 Staffers Sandra Pedicini, Lauren Ritchie, David Fleshler, Elyssa Cherney, David Harris and Brian Bennett contributed to this report. glotan@tribpub.com or 407-420-5774, gstutzman@tribpub.com or 407-650-6394 ||||| Orlando Nightclub Gunman Scouted Walt Disney World as Potential Target: Source 
 
 Disney 
 
 Phelan M. Ebenhack / AP 
 
 The gunman behind the Orlando nightclub shootings , the deadliest mass shooting in American history, recently scouted Walt Disney World as a potential target, a federal law enforcement source tells PEOPLE. Omar Mateen and his wife, Noor Zahi Salman, visited Walt Disney World in April, the source says. Salman told federal authorities on Sunday that her husband had more recently been "scouting Downtown Disney and Pulse [nightclub] for attacks."Unlike the four Disney World theme parks, Downtown Disney, which was recently renamed Disney Springs, doesn't have security and bag check before entry. Metal detectors have been installed outside Magic Kingdom, Hollywood Studios, Animal Kingdom and Epcot since 2015 and guests are selected at random for screening.Representatives for Walt Disney World did not immediately return phone calls seeking comment.Despite being investigated by the FBI twice before Sunday's tragedy in 2013 and 2014, Mateen bought an an AR-15-style assault rifle, a Sig Sauer RMCX, on June 4 – just one week before the attack, the source says. He also had a Glock model 17 9mm and a Smith and Wesson .38 caliber revolver.The first investigation by the FBI occurred after Mateen made concerning comments at work. As part of their investigation, the FBI interviewed witnesses, provided physical surveillance, and interviewed Mateen on two separate occasions, but the investigation was ultimately closed, according to a federal law enforcement source.In 2014, the FBI opened a second investigation into Mateen for his ties to Florida-born Moner Mohammad Abu-Salha , the first known American suicide bomber – who blew himself up in Syria in 2014. Mateen was interviewed as part of the investigation, but there was not enough evidence at the time and the case was closed, the source says.Over the previous month, Mateen used one of several Facebook accounts he operated to search the FBI and local police departments. He also looked up the San Bernadino shooters and a local gun range. On Sunday before the massacre, he posted about his allegiance to ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, writing: "May Allah accept me."According to police, Mateen opened fire just after 2 a.m. local time at Pulse, a popular gay club south of downtown Orlando. An off-duty officer working at the club initially responded to the shooter, "engaging in the gun battle with the suspect" before the suspect went back into the club, Orlando Police Chief John Mina said at a Sunday morning news conference.The shooter held several people hostage for several hours. At 5 a.m., police moved in to rescue the hostages. More gunshots followed, and police also used explosives in an attempt to distract the suspect. Eventually, Mateen was shot and killed.The gunman called 911 approximately 30 minutes after opening fire at Orlando's Pulse, a federal law enforcement official tells PEOPLE. On that call , he announced he was attacking the club and claimed he was armed with explosives – a claim that authorities have not confirmed and are "still exploring," the official says."The 911 operator, using reverse-call technology, called back the gunman and it was then that he pledged allegiance to [ISIS leader] Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi," the federal official tells PEOPLE. The gunman "also mentioned the Tsarnaev brothers," who orchestrated the Boston Marathon bombings of 2013, the official says.ISIS also claimed responsibility for the attack."Agents in Afghanistan are looking at the shooter's connections there," an FBI source with knowledge of the investigation tells PEOPLE. "He has family there. This is not to say his family is connected to the shootings. This is the normal course of an investigation like this. We ask questions.""The Islamic State called for attacks on the West during Ramadan," the source continues. "In the wake of San Bernardino, we are very much mindful of how this can play out."
– The night that Omar Mateen carried out the deadliest mass shooting in US history was far from his first visit to Orlando's Pulse nightclub, surviving customers say. The Orlando Sentinel spoke to at least four customers who recalled seeing Mateen in the LGBT club. Ty Smith says he had seen the 29-year-old there at least a dozen times and remembers him talking about his father and telling him he had a wife and child. "Sometimes he would go over in the corner and sit and drink by himself, and other times he would get so drunk he was loud and belligerent," Smith says. Another customer says Mateen had been coming in for years and was prone to violent outbursts. In other developments: Kevin West, another Pulse regular, tells the Los Angeles Times that he had exchanged occasional messages with Mateen for a year on the gay dating app Jack'd but had never laid eyes on him until an hour before the shooting, when he spotted him while dropping a friend off at the club. "He walked directly past me. I said, 'Hey,' and he turned and said, 'Hey,' and nodded his head," West says. "I could tell by the eyes." Pulse regular Cord Cedeno tells MSNBC that he and his friends had seen Mateen on gay dating apps, including Grindr. "I instantly blocked him because he was very creepy in his messages. I blocked him immediately," Cedeno says. No profiles of Mateen from such apps have surfaced yet, though Cedeno says two friends that encountered Mateen online have turned their phones over to the FBI. Lisa Lane, a performer at Pulse, tells the Advocate that she knows Mateen's face from her shows at the club. "He was one of my fans," she says. "Always when he saw me he would talk to me." In a look at Mateen's past, the AP finds an all-American list of early employers: Publix, Circuit City, Chick-fil-A, Walgreens, and Gold's Gym. He worked at a state prison for six months beginning in 2006 and was hired the following year by security firm G4S. His assignments included guard duty at the St. Lucie County Courthouse in Fort Pierce. Up until the Pulse massacre, he was working as a security guard at a gated retirement community. Former classmates at Florida's Martin County High School tell the Miami Herald that Mateen was a loner who behaved very strangely on the week of the 9/11 attacks—at one point, he claimed Osama bin Laden was his uncle—and was expelled soon afterward. A law enforcement source tells People that Mateen and his wife, Noor Zahi Salman, visited Walt Disney World in April, and Mateen may have been looking for potential targets at the time. NBC Bay Area reports that Salman, Mateen's second wife, grew up near San Francisco and moved to Florida around five years ago, which is apparently when she married Mateen. WSVN reports that she was accompanied by police officers Monday night when she went to the apartment she shared with Mateen and their 3-year-old son to pick up belongings.