Obama defends Boston bombing probe

President Barack Obama is defending the FBI’s handling of the Boston Marathon bombing investigation as Republicans prepare for oversight hearings on the attack.

President Obama told the Spanish-language television network Univision he does not think it is fair to say law enforcement “dropped the ball”.

The president says “there are going to be times where individuals decide they want to cause harm to people for crazy reasons, for no good reason, for ideological reasons”.

He says it is a challenge when would-be attackers are “self-radicalising” and not part of a broad conspiracy. Mr Obama said the FBI “can’t arrest somebody just based on a rumour”.

The first of a series of House hearings is set for Thursday before the GOP-led House Homeland Security Committee.