Suspect Faced Financial and Family Struggles in Recent Years

Shamsud-Din Jabbar, the Texas man accused of crashing a truck into New Year's Day revellers in New Orleans, killing 14 and injuring dozens, was a US Army veteran struggling to get past a recent divorce but who showed no signs of anger just weeks prior to the attack, his half-brother said.

Federal officials and local law enforcement in New Orleans say Jabbar had an ISIS flag on his pickup truck and posted a series of videos to social media professing his allegiance to the deadly militant group shortly before barrelling into the Bourbon Street crowd on the morning of Jan 1.

But what caused the 42-year-old Jabbar, a US citizen raised in Texas, to be radicalised remains unknown. He died at the scene in a shoot-out with police, officials said.

Mr Abdur Rahim Jabbar, the suspect's half-brother, said he had not noticed anything off-kilter when the two last spoke a few weeks ago, though he knew his half-brother was having trouble getting business ventures off the ground and was coming off his second divorce.

"He was maybe looking for some types of answers," Mr Jabbar told Reuters in an interview at his home in Beaumont, Texas, noting that his half-brother had recently renewed his Muslim faith after abandoning it in his 20s and 30s.

"He was smart, funny, charismatic, loving, compassionate, humble, and literally wouldn't hurt a fly. That's why it's so devastating," he added. "This degree of maliciousness is not like him. We are trying to understand what changed, too."