Hostages escaped as rescuers decided to breach Colleyville synagogue, FBI says
Rabbi Charlie Cytron-Walker alluded to texting with Colleyville Police Chief Michael Miller during the hostage standoff Jan. 15 at Congregation Beth Israel during a news conference on Friday, and FBI Special Agent in Charge Matt DeSarno said he was getting information from someone inside the synagogue.
DeSarno also said the decision to command the hostage rescue team to breach the synagogue came at the same time as hostages decided to make their escape.
“He became combative, issued deadlines,” DeSarno said Friday at the Colleyville news conference referring to the suspect’s actions Saturday.
Just after 9 p.m. Saturday, FBI officials and the hostages came to the same conclusion.
FBI agents were headed into the building while the hostages decided they had to escape.
The SWAT team encountered the hostages escaping, and then shot and killed Akram in the building.
“Rabbi Charlie and the other brave individuals, who were held hostage are survivors, and they are heroes,” DeSarno said.
Asked if there was coordination between hostages and the FBI or if it was a coincidence, DeSarno said he could not speak to coordination but that it was not a coincidence. He “authorized the team to go ... and Rabbi Charlie authorized himself and his people to go.”
Cytron-Walker and three of his congregants were held hostage by Malik Faisal Akram, whom DeSarno called a terrorist with antisemitic motives at Friday’s news conference. Akran was shot to death by members of the FBI Hostage Rescue Team. Akram was not the first person to attempt to trade U.S. hostages to free Aafia Siddiqui from a Fort Worth prison.
He said four other people have previously carried out terror attacks in which they attempted to trade American hostages for Siddiqui, a Pakistani neuroscientist who became the first female terrorism defendant arrested after 9/11, and she was convicted on charges related to the attempted murder and assault of United States officers and employees in Afghanistan in 2008.
Akram entered the synagogue before Shabbat services and was greeted by Cytron-Walker.
The rabbi and three congregants were running the service and were the only ones in the building; most members watch services on Zoom or Facebook Live.
Colleyville police also said they received a tip on Sunday from a resident who alerted them about making contact with the suspect on Jan. 14. on a bike trail.
Officers later found a mountain bike locked on a fence on the trail.
Authorities later unlocked the bike using a key that had been found on Akam after the hostage crisis ended Saturday night.
Chief Miller praised the work of dispatchers who were based in Keller
“They did a phenomenal job,” Miller said.
Miller noted they spoke to the suspect and the rabbi for more than hour Saturday before negotiators arrived.
At the same time, they were swamped with 911 calls from residents.
This report contains information from Fort Worth Star-Telegram archives.
This story was originally published January 21, 2022 at 4:33 PM.