The FBI is calling this a drug deal gone bad, but considering that both money and drugs were left behind, it doesn’t sound like drugs were the issue at all. And considering the date, the 10th anniversary of September 11 and the identities of the victims, there is a more obvious explanation.

But here’s the official story…

Dead Boston bombing suspect Tamerlan Tsarnaev and another man — who was killed by the FBI on Wednesday — murdered three people in Massachusetts after a drug deal went wrong in 2011, law enforcement sources tell NBC News.

Sources say that what began as a drug ripoff ended in a triple homicide when Tsarnaev and friend Ibragim Todashev realized their victims would later be able to identify them.

Todashev was killed by a federal agent while giving a statement on his role on Wednesday in Orlando, Fla.

The man who was shot, Todashev, 27, allegedly attacked an agent with a knife while confessing to the 3-year-old slayings. He was not suspected of having played any role in the bombing that killed three people and injured scores more in April, but he did confess to being involved in a brutal Boston-area slaying two years ago, investigators said.

“During the confrontation, the individual was killed and the agent sustained non-life threatening injuries,” according to the statement.

Brendan Mess, 25; Raphael Teken, 37; and Eric Weissman, 31, were found with their throats cut in September of 2011, and their bodies were covered with marijuana. No suspects had been arrested in that case.

One of the murdered men was Israeli.

The bodies of 25-year-old Brendan Mess and two other men were found with their throats cut on September 12, 2011, in what police deemed a triple homicide related to the drug trade. The bodies were covered almost ceremoniously with marijuana. And $5,000 was found in the apartment. Also, there was no sign of forced entry, suggesting Mess knew the killer or killers.

A few months after Mess’ murder, Tsarnaev went to Russia for six months. His father, Anzor Tsarnaev, told the Associated Press his son stayed with him in the city of Makhachkala, in the region of Dagestan. “He slept until 3 p.m., and you know, I would ask him: ‘Have you come here to sleep?’” his father said. “He used to go visiting, here and there. He would go to eat somewhere. Then he would come back and go to bed.”

It’s possible that the plan had been to hit them up for money to finance a Jihadist trip, but the money and drugs were both left behind making this something else entirely.

A local Jihad.