Edward Archer

PHILADELPHIA — Officer Jesse Hartnett was slowly patrolling his usual West Philadelphia beat just before midnight when a man appeared out of the darkness, firing a hail of bullets at close range as he charged toward the policeman’s car.

Hours later, police say, Edward Archer confessed to shooting the officer and told investigators he was following Allah, and had pledged his allegiance to the Islamic State group. Archer said he believed the police department defends laws that are contrary to Islam, police said.

Local and federal authorities spent much of Friday trying to verify the motive and executing search warrants at two Philadelphia area properties associated with Archer, hoping for more insight into how and why the shooting happened.

Archer’s mother told The Philadelphia Inquirer her 30-year-old son had been hearing voices recently and had felt targeted by police. She said the family had asked him to get help.

At a news conference, Philadelphia Police Commissioner Richard Ross, who just took office Tuesday, didn’t label the shooting a terrorist attack, though he said Archer “clearly gave us a motive.”

“It wasn’t like laying it out completely, chapter and verse for us,” Ross told reporters. “We’re left to say, ‘OK, he’s leaving a trail for us. Where’s it going to lead us, if anywhere?”’

He said the gun used to shoot Harnett had been stolen from a fellow officer’s home more than two years ago.

Police said there was no indication anyone else was involved, and it is unclear if and where Archer practiced his faith locally.

His mother, Valerie Holliday, described her son as devout Muslim. Jacob Bender, the executive director of the Philadelphia chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, an advocacy group, said he contacted about five inner-city mosques and found no one who knew of Archer.