A senior law enforcement source told the Daily Beast that Mateen was a person of interest both in 2013 and again in 2014.
An investigation was opened into the 29-year-old, but the case was closed when no evidence appeared to warrant further probing.
“He’s a known quantity,” the source said. “He’s been on the radar before.”
The senior law enforcement source told The Daily Beast that Mateen was born in New York and was married for a time to a woman from New Jersey.
That woman told the Washington Post that he repeatedly abused her during their marriage, which lasted from April 2009 to July 2011.
“He was not a stable person,” the ex-wife said. “He beat me. He would just come home and start beating me up because the laundry wasn’t finished or something like that.”
She stated that he was not very religious, adding that he “seemed like a normal human being.”
Police were at Mateen’s apartment in Port St. Lucie this morning. The FBI believe Mateen, who was shot dead by officers, may have ‘leanings to radical Islamic terrorism’