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Troubled portrait emerges of Army shooting suspect

“I got the impression that he was a committed soldier.” — Faizul Khan, former imam

His name appears on radical Internet postings.

A fellow officer says he fought his deployment to Iraq and argued with soldiers who supported US wars. He required counseling as a medical student because of problems with patients.

There are many unknowns about Nidal Malik Hasan, the man authorities say is responsible for the worst mass killing on a US military base — most of all, his motive. But details of his life and mindset, emerging from official sources and personal acquaintances, are troubling.

For six years before reporting for duty at Fort Hood, Texas, in July, the 39-year-old Army major worked at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center pursuing his career in psychiatry, as an intern, a resident and, last year, a fellow in disaster and preventive psychiatry. He received his medical degree from the military’s Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda, Maryland, in 2001.

While an intern at Walter Reed, Hasan had some “difficulties” that required counseling and extra supervision, said Thomas Grieger, who was the training director at the time.

Grieger said privacy laws prevented him from going into details, but noted that the problems had to do with Hasan’s interactions with patients. He recalled Hasan as a “mostly very quiet” person who never spoke ill of the military or his country.

But, more recently, federal agents grew suspicious.

At least six months ago, Hasan came to the attention of law enforcement officials because of Internet postings about suicide bombings and other threats, including posts that equated suicide bombers to soldiers who throw themselves on a grenade to save the lives of their comrades.

They had not determined for certain whether Hasan was the author of the posting, and a formal investigation had not been opened before the shooting, said law enforcement officials who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Hasan attended prayers regularly when he lived outside Washington, often in his army uniform, said Faizul Khan, a former imam at a mosque Hasan attended in Silver Spring, Maryland.

“I got the impression that he was a committed soldier,” Khan said.

He spoke often with Hasan about Hasan’s desire for a wife.

On a form filled out by those seeking spouses through a program at the mosque, Hasan listed his birthplace as Arlington, Virginia, but his nationality as Palestinian, Khan said.

“I don’t know why he listed Palestinian,” Khan said, “He was not born in Palestine.”
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