BRIDGEPORT, Conn. - Not long ago, Faisal Shahzad had a pretty enviable life: He became an American citizen after emigrating from Pakistan, where he came from a wealthy family. He earned an MBA. He had a well-educated wife and two kids and owned a house in a middle-class Connecticut suburb.
In the past couple of years, though, his life seemed to unravel: He left a job at a global marketing firm he'd held for three years, lost his home to foreclosure and moved into an apartment in an impoverished neighborhood in Bridgeport. And last weekend, authorities say, he drove an SUV loaded with explosives into Times Square intent on blowing it up.
The bomb didn't go off, and Shahzad was arrested on a plane in New York as he tried to leave the country. He was in custody Tuesday and couldn't be reached for comment. Authorities say he is cooperating and has admitted getting explosives training in his native Pakistan.
Shahzad's behavior sometimes seemed odd to his neighbors, and he surprised a real estate broker he hardly knew with his outspokenness about President George W. Bush and the Iraq war.
"He mentioned that he didn't like Bush policies in Iraq," said Igor Djuric, who represented Shahzad in 2004 when he was buying a home.
Djuric said he couldn't remember the exact words Shahzad used about Bush but "something to the effect of he doesn't know what he's doing and it's the wrong thing that he's doing."
"I don't know if he mentioned 9/11," Djuric said, "but something like that, Iraq has nothing to do with anything."
Shahzad, 30, is the son of a former top Pakistani air
force officer, according to Kifyat Ali, a cousin of Shahzad's father.
He came to the United States in late 1998 on a student visa, according
to an official who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of
anonymity due to the sensitive nature of the investigation into
Saturday's failed car bombing.
He took classes at the now-defunct Southeastern University in Washington, D.C., then enrolled at the University of Bridgeport, where he received a bachelor's degree in computer applications and information systems in 2000.
"He was personable, a nice guy, but unremarkable," said William Greenspan, adviser for undergraduate business students at the University of Bridgeport. "He would just come in and take the course as needed so he could graduate in a timely manner."
"If this didn't happen, I probably would have forgotten him," Greenspan said. "He didn't stand out."
Shahzad was granted an H1-B visa for skilled workers in 2002, according to the official who spoke to the AP. He later returned to the University of Bridgeport to earn a master's in business administration, awarded in 2005.
In 2004, he and his wife, Huma Mian, bought a newly built home for $273,000 at the height of the market in Shelton, a Fairfield County town that in recent years has attracted companies relocating to Connecticut's Gold Coast.
Like her husband, Mian was well educated. She graduated from the University of Colorado at Boulder in 2004 with a bachelor of science in business with an emphasis in accounting, the school said.
On her profile on the social networking site Orkut, she described herself as "not political" and said she spoke English, Pashto, Urdu and French. She listed her passions as "fashion, shoes, bags, shopping!! And of course, Faisal." She posted a picture of Shahzad, smiling, with the caption, "what can I say ... he's my everything."
Last year, the couple abandoned the home.
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