FBI releases transcripts of calls with Orlando shooter

The FBI released a partial transcript Monday of conversations between gunman Omar Mateen and Orlando police during his deadly rampage at Pulse nightclub June 12, in which Mateen called himself an Islamic soldier and refused to cooperate with hostage negotiators.

The transcript, which includes a 50-second phone conversation with police, sheds light on the deadliest mass shooting in modern American history. Mateen, 29, began firing inside the nightclub with a semi-automatic weapon and killed 49 people before dying in a shootout with police.

In the transcript, Mateen spoke with 911 at 2:35 a.m., after the shooting began, and told the dispatcher, “This is the shooter... I did the shootings.”

When asked repeatedly for his name, Mateen simply repeated that he “pledge[d] allegiance” to a redacted name. Law enforcement authorities said they were not releasing the full transcripts because they did not want to “give credence” to the “violent rhetoric,” but they had previously said Mateen pledged allegiance to the Islamic State in a call to 911 and mentioned the Tsarnaev brothers responsible for the 2013 Boston marathon bombings.

Authorities also said they were not releasing the 911 calls made by victims of the shootings out of respect for those affected.

Mateen, in another call with police, also threatened to detonate bombs in a vehicle outside and said he had a vest like the kind “used in France.” He also threatened, “In the next few days, you’re going to see more of this type of action going on.”

Orlando Police Chief John Mina said in a news conference Monday following the release of the transcripts he also wanted to dispel the myth that officers weren’t doing anything during a three-hour period when no shooting was taking place. He said that officers on the scene stopped the active shooting and drove Mateen into a club bathroom where he took hostages.

“During that time our officers were in and out of that club saving people,” Mina said. He said officers were also preparing for an explosive entry to rescue the hostages.

“So that does take time,” Mina said.

The police chief said shooting resumed again when the hostage rescue operation began, in which officers blew through a wall of the club and shot Mateen.

The shooter also pledged allegiance to the Islamic State on Facebook before he died, according to Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wisconsin. “In the next few days you will see attacks from the Islamic state in the usa,” Mateen wrote. Johnson called on Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg to release Mateen’s data and wrote that Mateen allegedly checked Facebook during the shooting to see if it had begun trending on the site.

Federal investigators are trying to build a complete profile of the shooter to prevent another massacre, U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch said Sunday.

“We are going back and learning everything we can about this killer, about his contacts, people who may have known him or seen him,” Lynch added on ABC’s “This Week.” “We’re trying to build that profile so that we can move forward.”

Lynch will travel to Orlando Tuesday to meet with investigators, she said.

This story was originally published June 20, 2016 at 10:57 AM with the headline "FBI releases transcripts of calls with Orlando shooter."