Teen in mosque shooting flagged to police for idolizing Nazis a year before attack
AP News • • nation
Key Points:
- Caleb Vazquez, one of the teenagers who killed three people at a San Diego mosque, was flagged last year for alarming behavior and Nazi idolization, leading to the confiscation of 26 guns from his father's home under a California law targeting dangerous individuals.
- Court records reveal Vazquez had mental health struggles, including a prior involuntary psychiatric hospitalization, and his family noted he was on the autism spectrum and influenced by extremist online content.
- Vazquez and his accomplice Cain Clark, both radicalized online, expressed white supremacist views and hatred toward multiple groups in writings, and Clark’s mother reported missing weapons before the shooting and their subsequent suicides.
- Despite family efforts to seek help through therapy, monitoring, and rehabilitation, experts highlight the increasing difficulty of de-radicalizing youth due to the complex, meme-driven nature of online extremist content.
- Police began searching for the teens after Clark's mother reported him missing and suicidal; the shooting occurred during the search at the Islamic Center of San Diego.