Slain student who went on knife rampage in California wanted to cut someone's head even as he praised Allah, says sheriff

Faisal Mohammad in a photo taken from his school ID at the University of California, Merced. (UC Merced)

Faisal Mohammad, the 18-year-old California college student who stabbed four people in his school last Wednesday, had a two-page handwritten manifesto found in his pocket that outlined his specific plan for murder, including cutting someone's head, according to officials of Merced County, California.

Sheriff Vern Warnke told FoxNews that the document found by the county coroner indicated a numeric list detailing Mohammad's plans of who he wanted to kill, and how, including beheading and shooting his victims before he was fatally shot by police on the same day.

"No. 27 was to 'make sure people are tied down,' No. 28 was 'sit down and praise Allah,'" Warnke said. "I remember seeing four or five times, scribbled on the side of the two-page manifesto, where he wrote something like 'praise Allah,'" he added.

"There was a gruesome statement he made about wanting to cut someone's head off and kill two people with one bullet, and he planned to shoot the police," Warnke said.

"He did not have a firearm with him and didn't seem to have a lot of experience with firearms because he thought he could kill two people with one bullet. He reminded himself in the list to raise the gun slowly. He scripted everything out in chronological order."

Police also found a printout of the Islamic State flag among the assailant's belongings.

Mohammad, a computer and engineering student tried to execute his plan starting at around 8 a.m. Wednesday last week when he arrived in his classroom with an 8-inch hunting knife. The college boy slashed and stabbed four people, including two students, a student aide and Byron Price, a 31-year-old construction manager who intervened.

After the stabbing spree, he fled the classroom after he was overwhelmed by Price and another construction worker who was about to hit Mohammad with a ladder, Fox News reported.

Police said Mohammad would have continued his knife attacks, and possibly claimed more lives, if he hadn't been interrupted by the construction team, and then shot dead by police afterward.

"He had a smile on his face, he was having fun, which is more the thing that bothers me," said Price, who was managing the construction site at the university for his family's construction company.

Based on investigations conducted by law enforcers, including Warnke, Mohammad was found to have no ties to any terrorist group.

"There was nothing to indicate he was doing this because of Allah, or because he was going to be rewarded with 72 virgins, or because of ties to a terror group," Warnke said. "He appeared to be a devout Muslim, on the strong side of the belief."

But Warnke said the FBI is still thoroughly investigating this angle.

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