Kith, kin say shift to US changed Shahzad from liberal to terror suspect

NEW YORK - What was the turning point that transformed him into an alleged terrorist? That is the question that has loomed large ever since Monday’s arrest of 30-year-old Pakistani American Faizal Shahzad for the attempted car bombing of Times Square.ccordingly, an ABC News team traveled to Peshawar to speak with his acquaintances and find the beginning of the trail to a potential bombing.

What emerges is that Shahzad was by local standards from a wealthy family and friends described him as a “mama’s boy” who hated violence when young.

However, one of his cousin’s says he can’t believe Shahzad had a role to play in the foiled Time Square bombing plot.

“He wasn’t that type of person,” he says.

His family was apparently not religious. Family friends say they were never seen praying.

Faisal Shazad’s family are a professional, educated family.

Friends say two of his siblings moved to Canada, and one of his sisters is a doctor.

According to people in Pakistan who knew him, his shift to the United States 11 years ago changed him.

Villagers in Mohib Banda told ABC News, “before his marriage he was liberal, even cosmopolitan. After, he changed.”

This change also turned him against the United States of America, people who knew him said.

“We talked about the American policies toward Muslims in Iraq and Afghanistan,” a childhood friend of Shahzad, Nasir Khan, told ABC News. “He was very much angry at that.”

Khan said he last saw his former friend 18 months ago. (ANI)