As investigators continued to search for answers following a shooting Wednesday at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Texas, that left one detainee dead and two others wounded, the family of 29-year-old suspect Joshua Jahn struggled to process the news.
Reached by phone at her home in a Dallas suburb, shortly after the deadly incident but before authorities had publicly identified Jahn as the suspect, his distraught mother attempted, but was unable, to put her whipsawing emotions into words.
“I’m sorry, I can’t talk to you right now,” Sharon Jahn told The Independent while sobbing openly. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. But I just can’t talk to you now.”
The first shots rang out at around 6:20 a.m., according to authorities. The shooter “fired indiscriminately” at the building, as well as at a transport van in the structure’s sallyport, where the victims were hit, the Department of Homeland Security said.
Jahn’s body was discovered on the roof of a nearby immigration attorney’s office. Police said he died from a self-inflicted gunshot.
Joshua Jahn, seen here in a 2016 mugshot, was found dead from a self-inflicted gunshot after allegedly opening fire on an ICE facility in Dallas (Collin County Sheriff; Getty Images)
Jahn’s 65-year-old father, Andrew, is a retired mechanical engineer. Sharon, also 65 and retired, worked as the administrator of a massage school in Plano. Jahn has two siblings, a 26-year-old sister Kioko and a 30-year-old brother, Noah.
Noah Jahn was equally distressed over the shooting Wednesday, telling The Independent that he was not prepared to discuss the situation in any detail. However, it was clear he was just starting to come to grips with what had happened that morning.
“I’m still trying to…” Noah Jahn said haltingly. “I’m back and forth with the police, I’m just…” He then hung up.
Andrew Jahn was unable to be reached.
In an earlier interview, Noah Jahn told NBC News that his brother was not particularly political, and “didn’t have strong feelings about ICE, as far as I knew.” Jahn’s voter info shows he was not registered to any particular party.
FBI agents seen standing on the roof from which investigators believe the sniper killed two ICE detainees and wounded a third (REUTERS)
However, law enforcement officials said unspent shell casings located near the shooter’s remains had “anti-ICE messages” on them. FBI director Kash Patel posted a photo on social media showing what appeared to be a rifle round with the words “ANTI-ICE” scrawled on it.
At the same time, Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson emphasized that the situation remained fluid while police investigated.
“Let’s be patient, let’s remain calm, and let’s let our law enforcement partners… do their job,” Johnson said at a press conference. “This is an active investigation. There are still a lot of unanswered questions, and I want to encourage all of you to exercise a little bit of restraint and allow them to do their job.”
Details about the number of victims and their injuries changed numerous times Wednesday, due to conflicting information being released by federal officials.
The names of the victims in Wednesday’s attack have not been released.
Noah Jahn also told NBC that his parents owned a rifle and that his brother was a competent shooter. But, he insisted his brother was “not a marksman, that’s for sure,” expressing disbelief that he could have carried out the killings.
A photo posted by FBI Director Kash Patel, showing unspent shell casings found by police near the scene of Wednesday’s shooting at an ICE field office in Dallas (X/@FBIDirectorKash)
Bullet holes can be seen in the glass of a framed American flag inside the Dallas, Texas ICE facility where three people were shot on Wednesday morning (X/@TriciaOhio)
Joshua Jahn did not have a serious criminal history, according to a review of public records. In 2016, he was caught delivering more than a quarter-ounce but less than five pounds of marijuana, a felony to which he later entered a deferred guilty plea. Jahn received five years probation, a $500 fine, and was ordered to pay $180 restitution, court filings show.
Last month, at the same Dallas ICE facility, 36-year-old Bratton Dean Wilkinson was charged with making terroristic threats and falsely claiming to have a bomb in his backpack.
Morale among ICE agents has reportedly sunk to an all-time low amid President Donald Trump’s mass deportation policy, which has soured public opinion as the federal crackdown has expanded nationwide.
ICE personnel on official missions are met regularly by jeering crowds of protesters; the federal government is simultaneously trying to recruit some 10,000 new agents in a colossal expansion spurred on by the Trump administration.
To attract applicants, ICE is offering recruits six-figure salaries, five-figure signing bonuses, and student loan forgiveness.
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