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FBI, NYPD Arrest 4 in Alleged Plot to Bomb NY Synagogues
Wed, May 20, 2009
EXCLUSIVE: Four New York City men were arrested Wednesday in connection with an alleged plot to blow up New York City synagogues and other city locations, WNBC's Jonathan Dienst has learned. Raids by the FBI-NYPD Joint Terrorist Task Force in the Bronx captured the suspected ringleader and three followers in what law enforcement sources are calling a homegrown terrorist plot.
Investigators stress the suspects' meetings had been infiltrated early on and there was "no chance" the alleged plot could succeed. Investigators said several of the suspects are Muslims who allegedly talked about destroying two Jewish temples, including at least one in the Riverdale section of the Bronx. Prosecutors also said the men discussed tyring to shoot down military planes at Stewart Airport. The four suspects were identified as James Cromitie, David Williams, Onta Williams and Laguerre Payen.
The men ordered and accepted delivery of materials they believed were bomb-making ingredients, authorities said. But investigators said they made sure the materials the suspects received were inert. Officials tell WNBC they moved in now so the alleged plot could not progress any further.
The four men are in custody and are expected to be arraigned Thursday in White Plains federal court on terrorism-related counts. An official announcement of the arrests is expected later Wednesday or Thursday morning. The motives behind the alleged plot are not yet known, but authorities said that Cromitie was apparently upset over the war in Afghanistan.
Excerpted
http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/FBI-Bust-Plot-Foiled.html
Plot to blow up New York synagogue was hatched in Newburgh, feds say
NEW YORK – Four men are in federal custody following their arrests on charges that they conspired to use weapons of mass destruction in the United States, specifically to blow up a synagogue in the Bronx and military planes at the Air National Guard Base at Stewart Airport.
The plot was hatched in a house in Newburgh, authorities said Wednesday night. The men are all current residents of Newburgh.
Authorities arrested James Cromitie, also known as Abdul Rahman; Onta Williams, also known as Hamza; David Williams, also known as Daoud; and Laguerre Payen, also known as Amin on charges arising from a plot to detonate explosives near a synagogue in the Riverdale section of the Bronx and to shoot military planes at the Air Guard Base at Stewart Airport with Stinger surface-to-air guided missiles.
In June 2008, an informant working with the FBI met with Cromitie in Newburgh. He told the informant that has parents had lived in Afghanistan and that he was upset about the war there and that many Muslim people were being killed in Afghanistan and Pakistan by the military forces.
Cromitie expressed interest in returning to Afghanistan and spoke to the informant about how, if he were to die a martyr, he would go to “paradise.”
Beginning in October 2008, the informant began meeting with Cromitie at a house in Newburgh that the FBI had equipped with concealed video and audio equipment. During those meetings is when the four suspects discussed their desire to attack certain targets in New York.
Beginning in April 2009, the four men selected the synagogue and Jewish community center they intended to target, and conducted surveillance, including photographs, of military planes at the Air Guard Base.
In April of this year, two of the men bought a nine millimeter semi-automatic pistol for use during the planned terrorist operations. At the same time, two of the men went to a location from which they could shoot at the military planes with surface-to-air guided missiles.
The informant later told the men to drive toward Stamford, CT to obtain what the defendants were told would be a surface-to-air guided missile system and three improvised explosive devices containing C-4 plastic explosive material.
The informant gave the men a Stinger missile provided by the FBI that was inoperable, as well as three IEDs that each contained over 30 pounds of inert C-4 explosives.....
http://www.midhudsonnews.com/News/2009/May09/20/Terror_plot-20May09.htm
THANK YOU for the ping Oorang.
Great job and kudos to the NYPD Joint Terrorism Task Force and the FBI.
Thanks girls for the updates, bunch of ugly looking creeps up to no good. Great job by FBI and the Bush Adm.
I’m off to work.
For the CheneyChick women. :)
Drudge_Report CNN Poll: Favorable opinion of Dick Cheney on the rise... http://tinyurl.com/qp296k
Thanks Oorang. After watching American Idol the local news came on at 10:00 pm with this breaking story.