A gunman sat in a car in front of the home of the spiritual leader of Utah’s largest mosque Monday evening, waiting for the cleric to enter or leave after sunset prayers.
He then started shooting, firing multiple rounds.
All of them missed Imam Shuaib Din, who heads the Utah Islamic Center in West Jordan, near the border of Sandy.
“Obviously, he knew my house, knew my car, knew my schedule,” Din told The Salt Lake Tribune on Tuesday morning.
It is the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, when Muslims fast from sunrise to sunset for 30 straight days, and pray five times daily.
On Monday, Din decided to break his fast with his family at his home, which is about two minutes from the mosque.
As soon as the imam pulled out of his garage to return to the mosque for 7:45 p.m. prayers, he said, the gunman — wearing a mask and hoodie — got out of his car, shot at him and took off.
That’s when the soft-spoken Muslim leader called 911.
(The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) Imam Shuaib Din of the Utah Islamic Center offers the benediction at an event in 2024. The spiritual leader was targeted by a gunman.
The dispatcher asked Din if he got the shooter’s license plate number. He hadn’t. So the imam decided to try to get it. But the man pulled up next to him, Din said, got out of his car and fired eight more shots.
Bullets went through the front seat and back seat, the imam said, as well as the windshield.
Din decided not to follow any more.
The Sandy Police Department confirmed that Din’s vehicle was struck “multiple times.”
Police are “using all available resources including communicating with the FBI,” said Sandy Sgt. Michael Olsen, “to be able to complete our investigation, and locate any and all possible suspects.”
At this time, Olsen said, police “do not have a suspect in custody.”
On Tuesday afternoon, police released four photos of what they believe to be the suspect’s vehicle, which they described as “a white passenger car, [which] may have minor damage or a piece of the vehicle hanging below the front bumper on the passenger side.”
(Sandy Police Department) Photos of the car that Sandy police believe was used by a suspect who attempted to shoot Imam Shuaib Din, leader of Utah Islamic Society in West Jordan on Monday evening.
The Utah Islamic Center appreciates the police investigation, it said in a statement on its website, and asked the community “to avoid speculation.”
It also said “heightened security measures will be in place at [the mosque] to ensure the safety of all who attend.”
It added: “May Allah protect our imam and our community.”
The Council on American-Islamic Relations, the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, has offered a $5,000 reward, it said in an email, “for information leading to the arrest and conviction of a suspect.”
The group also called for stepped-up police protection for the imam and the Muslim community.
Sandy Mayor Monica Zoltanski and her City Council said they were “deeply troubled” by the shooting and expressed gratitude that Din was not physically harmed.
“While the motive remains under investigation, we cannot ignore that this occurred during the sacred month of Ramadan — a time of prayer, reflection, and peace for Muslims around the world,“ they wrote on social media. That makes this especially unsettling for our community. ... To our Muslim residents and neighbors: You are valued members of Sandy. We stand with you.”
For his part, Din could not imagine who might have attacked him.
“It is likely someone outside my community,” he said, “If so, it is possibly a hate crime.”
It took him hours after the shooting to calm down, Din said. “I was pretty shook up.”