
The family of YouTube shooter Nasim Aghdam says they are in shock and can't make sense of what happened - as it is revealed she went to a gun range just hours before opening fire on the tech campus with her legally held 9mm handgun.

Aghdam's relatives issued a statement on Wednesday expressing their 'utmost regret' a day after she shot three people at YouTube's headquarters in San Bruno, California and then killed herself.

'Our family is in absolute shock and can't make sense of what has happened. Although no words can describe our deep pain for this tragedy, our family would like to express their utmost regret, sorry for what has happened to innocent victims,' the family wrote.

'Our thoughts and prayers are with them and their families. We are praying for speedy recovery of the injured and ask God to bestow patience upon all persons hurt in this horrific senseless act.'

It came as police revealed new information about the shooting rampage, saying Aghdam did not know any of the three people she wounded but was angry over a change in YouTube policies that meant she no longer earned money from her bizarre content.

They also revealed that she snuck onto YouTube's 200,000 sq ft 'campus' through a parking garage but that she parked her own vehicle behind another business nearby.

She had been reported missing by family members on April 2 and was last seen by them on March 31.

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YouTube shooter Nasim Aghdam had complained to her family that YouTube 'ruined her life' by stopping lucrative ads on her various channels over concerns about her content which included bizarre workouts she performed in tight catsuits (above). She said it was 'censorship' and that they were blocking free speech

Another image from one of Aghdam's videos shows her dressed in a ninja's outfit. On Tuesday, she wore a 'headscarf and glasses' to go on a shooting rampage at YouTube HQ in San Bruno, California, 500 miles from her home, before killing herself

In another video, she parodied Taylor Swift to sing her own version of the singer's hit Blank Space. She is pictured kissing her rabbit

Early on Tuesday, police in Mountain View, a Silicon Valley hub around 30 miles from YouTube's HQ, found her sleeping in her car. They clearly did not consider her a risk despite her father telling them she was angry at YouTube when she left her home 500 miles away days earlier.

The cops who found her in her car at 1.40am have now claimed she was calm and spoke to them for 20 minutes when they questioned her.

TIMELINE OF YOUTUBE SHOOTING March 31: Last time Nasim Aghdam's family in Manifee, California, hears from her April 2: Her father reports her missing to police in San Diego, tells them she is angry at YouTube and she is entered into the Missing Persons database April 3, 1.40am: Police in Mountain View, 30 miles from San Bruno, find Aghdam sleeping in her car and take her off the missing person's database April 3 morning: Aghdam visits the Jackson Arms gun range, two miles from YouTube HQ 12.46pm: Aghdam opens fire on YouTube campus in San Bruno after sneaking in through garage door 12.48pm: Police arrive at 'chaotic' YouTube HQ to find employees fleeing 12.53pm: Aghdam's body is found by picnic tables on outdoor eating area Advertisement

They said she told them she had left home because of family problems and that they did not know, as Aghdam's family claimed they had told authorities, that she was angry with the company.

She claimed she was in the area to stay with relatives and was looking for work.

After finding her in her car in a strip mall in Mountain View, police removed Aghdam from the missing person's database and she was free to go on to the Jackson Arms gun range, two miles from YouTube's campus.

After getting in some practice, she went to the YouTube campus and opened fire at 12.46pm, injuring three people before turning the gun on herself.

The owner was not available for comment when DailyMail.com visited early Wednesday morning. Workers at the range claimed not to have seen Aghdam when she visited the range yesterday and refused to speak further.

But Jose Villaluna, who rents warehouse space next door to the gun range, told DailyMail.com that Aghdam had been seen at Jackson Arms.

'She might have been, yes,' he said, adding that he had been told by a gun range worker. 'They say it's a possibility that she was. I guess they saw her face. That they might have seen her yesterday.

Less than 15 minutes after the store opened at 11am, an officer from San Bruno PD was seen arriving.

Aghdam was living with her grandmother in San Diego. On Wednesday, armed police searched through what is believed to be her home.

A neighbor told DailyMail.com that several officers shouted at her to 'Get inside, stay inside' as they began searching the first floor apartment. The neighbor, who wanted to remain anonymous, said: 'There were a lot of police here at 9am today. Some had handguns.

'They shouted at me to get inside and stay inside. I wanted to look at what was happening but I couldn't. I did later see them take away bags of evidence from inside. There were a lot of bags. I don't know what was in them.'

Another neighbor added: 'It was a big drama. I saw a lot of people outside the apartment and two police cars were blocking off the road.'

Aghdam moved to the US as a teenager in 1996 along with her family from Iran. She is shown as a child (left in an edited photo) with unidentified relatives. In the weeks before the shooting, she complained there was less free speech in America than in the Middle East

Law enforcement officers swoop on an apartment complex in San Diego on Wednesday where Aghdam had been living prior to the rampage

There was no sign of Aghdam's grandmother at the small home this afternoon and no officers could be seen guarding the property.

Outside, two pairs of shoes had been left by the door mat and it was possible to see a light left on inside. A teapot was still on a table on the balcony.

Aghdam is not thought to have been living at the property long, with neighbors telling DailyMail.com she was rarely seen.

The neighbor explained: 'I saw the old lady there very occasionally and we were friends. I did not know her name. She had not been there long.

'I never saw Nasim there which I think is off because I at least see the other neighbors even if I don't know their names.

'If she was living there she had not been there long.'

Two of the woman's victims were released from hospital on Wednesday but one continues to require care. None of their identities have been released.

She shot herself dead after injuring three people.

Earlier, the woman's family in Manifee, California, revealed that they came to the US from Iran in 1996 and that she believed there was less free speech in America than in the Middle East.

Until recently, Aghdam had been making a living through monetized commercials and posts on YouTube where she had gathered thousands of followers through multiple English and Farsi channels.

She had previously founded animal rights charities in California but her vlogging appeared to be the focus of her life.

Her eclectic content ranged from workout videos in tight catsuits to Taylor Swift parodies, animal slaughtering videos and what she described as educational posts about the 'dangers' of anal sex.

She became outraged, however, when the video site started 'censoring' her content and removing the lucrative ads which had kept her afloat.

'She was always complaining that YouTube ruined her life,' Shahran Aghdam told The Press Enterprise in southern California.

Before going to YouTube at lunchtime, she spent some time at Jackson Arms shooting range in San Bruno

The entrance to the gun range where the woman was spotted on Tuesday before carrying out the attack. Jose Villulana, who rents warehouse space next door to the range, said he saw Aghdam there on Tuesday morning before the attack

This is the apartment building where Aghdam was most recently believed to have lived with her grandmother. Police searched it at 9am on Wednesday

A graphic illustrates Nasim's movements on the day of the shooting from when she was found by police in the early hours until she went to the gun range and on to YouTube HQ

Despite earlier reports and public records which say Aghdam was 39, her brother said Wednesday would have been her 38th birthday.

'She chose the day to die the day she came,' he added. She left no suicide note and her family remains uncertain how she obtained the handgun used in the shooting.

According to the newspaper, Aghdam's mother could be heard weeping inside the home as her brother spoke in the foyer.

In a March Instagram post, Aghdam suggested there was not as much freedom in her adopted home as there was in Iran.

'When it comes to freedom of speech do you think Iran is better than the USA or the USA is better than Iran?' she said.

On Saturday, she left her grandmother's home, where she had recently moved into, to drive to San Bruno, 500 miles away near San Francisco.

Her worried father called police to tell them she was missing and that he feared she might be headed towards the tech company's sprawling, 200,000 sq ft 'college-like' campus.

This is the home Aghdam once lived in in Menifee, California, with her family who remain there. She recently moved to her grandmother's home in San Diego

Staffers returned to work on Wednesday and waited to be escorted into the building by police. One wore a YouTube t-shirt

Employees returned to work on Wednesday as police handed the scene back over to the tech giant. It is likely they were back to collect their things which they left in a hurry while being evacuated on Tuesday

A group of staffers are pictured leaving the building on Wednesday morning presumably after going inside to collect their discarded possessions. An umbrella stand which was kicked over in a rush by a stampede of frightened staffers remained on the ground

On Monday, she was found asleep in her car by security guards. Questions are now arising over how she was able to gain access to the campus at all.

Using a handgun, Aghdam shot three people then killed herself in the space of several minutes during lunchtime on Tuesday.

Her body was found next to lunch tables in an outdoor area of the campus where employees had been celebrating a colleague's birthday.

Law enforcement officials had initially said the shooting was being investigated as a domestic dispute after early indications suggested she had shot her boyfriend.

Aghdam, who was a self-described animal rights activist and 'vegan bodybuilder', had a significant online presence with multiple YouTube channels and social media pages.

Authorities cover a body with a yellow tarp at YouTube's headquarters in the San Francisco Bay Area on Tuesday after a female shooter opened fire before she shot and killed herself. Smashed glass on one of the doors is also shown

Aghdam, who is from Southern California but is Persian, regularly complained online that YouTube were filtering and demonetizing her various video channels

In a video that Aghdam posted back in January 2017, she vented about her content being censored. She also said that her YouTube channel, which had more than 5,000 subscribers, used to get many views but claimed she started getting less when the company 'filtered' her videos.

Aghdam's YouTube channels and social media pages were all removed in the hours after the shooting.

Her father Ismail Aghdam said she had told family members that YouTube had stopped paying her for content she posted on the site.

He told the Bay Area News Group that he had warned police his daughter hated YouTube and she might be headed to their headquarters.

He had reported her missing from Southern California on Monday morning after she went two days without answering her phone. Ismail said police contacted him at about 2am on Tuesday to say they had found her sleeping in her car roughly 470 miles from her hometown.

Ismail said police told him that everything was 'in control' but he told them she had spoken of her hatred of YouTube in recent weeks.

Aghdam, who was a self-confessed animal rights activist and 'vegan bodybuilder', had a significant online presence with multiple YouTube channels and social media pages

Aghdam was a prolific YouTuber who had ranted online against the company's new policies and for 'censoring her videos and not paying her'

In a video that Aghdam posted back in 2017, she vented about her content being 'discriminated and filtered'. She is a self-described Persian animal rights activist and 'vegan bodybuilder'

Aghdam is a self-described Persian animal rights activist and 'vegan bodybuilder'. She was a prolific YouTuber who had ranted online against the company's new policies

Hours later at about 1pm, officers and federal agents swarmed YouTube's headquarters after dozens of panicked employees called 911 to report gunfire.

Shooting comes after YouTube policy change The father of Nasim Aghdam says she was angry at the company because it stopped paying her for videos she posted on the platform. Ismail Aghdam told the Bay Area News Group that he warned police his daughter might be going to YouTube because she 'hated' the company. Details of any payments she may have been receiving have not yet been disclosed. The shooting comes weeks after YouTube agreed to manually review all videos in its 'preferred' section so advertisers were sure they were not promoting harmful videos. As well as manual reviews, YouTube tightened its rules on who qualifies for posting money-making ads. Previously, channels with 10,000 total views qualified for the YouTube Partner Program which allows creators to collect some income from the adverts placed before their videos. But YouTube's parent company Google announced that from February 20, channels would need 1,000 subscribers and to have racked up 4,000 hours of watch time over the last 12 months regardless of total views, to qualify. This is the biggest change to advertising rules on the site since its inception - and is another attempt to prevent the platform being 'co-opted by bad actors' after persistent complaints from advertisers over the past twelve months. The changes came just weeks after YouTuber Logan Paul's video showing the body of a suicide victim reached the site's trending page before being removed. YouTube's new threshold means a creator making a weekly ten-minute video would need 1,000 subscribers and an average of 462 views per video to start receiving ad revenue. Advertisement

When they arrived, police found Aghdam dead from self-inflicted gunshot wounds.

San Bruno Police Chief Ed Barberini said three people were taken to hospitals in San Francisco with gunshot wounds. Investigators do not believe Nasim Aghdam specifically targeted the three victims.

A 36-year-old man was in critical condition, a 32-year-old woman was in serious condition and a 27-year-old woman was in fair condition following the shooting.

Television news footage showed terrified employees leaving the building in a line, holding their arms in the air for police to inspect as they were leaving the building.

Officers patted down people to make sure none had weapons as police vehicles surrounded the area.

Senior software engineer Zach Vorhies said a fire alarm had gone off in the building and workers were calmly evacuating before they realized it was an active shooting.

Vorhies said as they were leaving he saw the shooter in a courtyard yelling: 'Come at me, or come get me.'

He said he froze and then noticed a victim on his back with what looked like a gunshot wound to his stomach. Vorhies said an officer with an assault rifle then came through a security door.

Another employee, Dianna Arnspiger, said she was on the building's second floor when she heard gunshots, ran to a window and saw the shooter on a patio outside.

'It was a woman and she was firing her gun. I just said, 'Shooter,' and everybody started running,' Arnspiger said. 'It was terrifying.'

The police chief said at a press conference that officers discovered one victim with a gunshot wound when they arrived and then found the shooter with what appeared to be a self-inflicted gunshot wound several minutes later.

He said two additional gunshot victims were later located at an adjacent business and that a fourth injured person suffered an ankle injury.

The adjacent business was a Carl's Jr on the same plaza where two women fled after being shot.

Police did not release any further information on the suspect or comment on her possible motives for the shooting rampage.

The shooting had no known connection to terrorism, US government security officials said.

Disturbing live accounts were given by YouTube employees who took to Twitter as the shooting unfolded.

Terrified employees were spotted leaving YouTube's headquarters in San Bruno, California in a line after a shooter opened fire on Tuesday afternoon

A SWAT team is picturing entering YouTube HQ in San Bruno, California, on Tuesday after reports of shots being fired inside

An injured woman stands outside YouTube's headquarters, while another employee cries on the phone after escaping the shooting on Tuesday

In a flurry of tweets, project manager Todd Sherman said: 'We were sitting in a meeting and then we heard people running because it was rumbling the floor. First thought was earthquake.

'After existing (sic) the room we still didn't know what was going on but more people were running. Seemed serious and not like a drill.

'We headed towards the exit and then saw more people and someone said that there was a person with a gun. S**t.

'At that point every new person I saw was a potential shooter. Someone else said that the person shot out the back doors and then shot themselves.

'I looked down and saw blood drips on the floor and stairs. Peaked (sic) around for threats and then we headed downstairs and out the front.'

Employee Vadim Lavrusik was one of the first to report the shooting, tweeting at around 1pm on Tuesday: 'Active shooter at YouTube HQ. Heard shots and saw people running while at my desk. Now barricaded inside a room with coworkers.'

Soon after, he tweeted: 'Safe. Got evacuated it. Outside now.'

Officers and federal agents swarmed YouTube's headquarters complex just before 1pm after dozens of panicked employees called 911 to report gunfire

Heavily armed police stood guard outside the front entrance of YouTube's headquarters after the shooting broke out on Tuesday afternoon

Police search a building at YouTube's corporate headquarters as an active shooter situation was underway in San Bruno on Tuesday

YouTube employees leave the scene on Tuesday after a woman shot four people then herself

Google CEO Sundar Pichai said the parent company of YouTube was doing everything it can to support the victims and their families

Google CEO Sundar Pichai called the shooting a 'horrific act of violence'.

He said the parent company of YouTube was doing everything it can to support the victims and their families.

Pichai also said the company 'will continue to provide support to help everyone in our Google family heal from this unimaginable tragedy'.

The YouTube headquarters has more than a thousand engineers and other employees in several buildings on its 200,000 sq ft campus.

President Donald Trump offered his 'thoughts and prayers' after being briefed on the shooting.

There was an onslaught of emergency vehicles at the scene moments after the shots were fired

Officers are pictured running towards YouTube's San Bruno HQ on Tuesday amid reports of a shooter

'Our thoughts and prayers are with everybody involved. Thank you to our phenomenal Law Enforcement Officers and First Responders that are currently on the scene,' he tweeted on Tuesday afternoon.

Following the shooting, California Republican congressman Dana Rohrabacher speculated that the shooter could have been an illegal immigrant.

Without any facts, Rohrabacher drew links between the shooting and sanctuary cities during an interview with the Fox Business Network.

'You were going to discuss with me about sanctuary cities and the sanctuary state movement, and it fits right into what you're talking about right now,' he said.

'Would anyone be surprised? We have a state government in California that's trying to prevent our law enforcement people from working with the federal law enforcement people to get together the criminal illegal aliens, to deal with criminal illegal aliens.'