3 Brooklyn Men Charged With Trying to Aid ISIS

Marc Santora and Stephanie Clifford

February 26, 2015

3 Brooklyn Men Accused of Plot to Aid ISIS’ Fight

Two young men living in Brooklyn were arrested on Wednesday and charged with plotting to travel thousands of miles to fight under the banner of the Islamic State, the terrorist organization that has seized a wide expanse of Syria and Iraq.

A third Brooklyn man was charged with helping organize and fund their activities.

Even as the Islamic State has been waging a brutal war in the Middle East, it has been spearheading an aggressive campaign to recruit Muslims to its cause, using social media to target young people across the world.

It has drawn thousands of fighters from nearby nations, tapping into a range of resentments, such as political oppression and personal disillusionment. More recently, the group has found scores of willing recruits in Europe, many inspired by the group’s gruesome videos of atrocities.

Now, the authorities say, its reach has extended into New York, to three men drawn by its apocalyptic message. 

One of the men who allegedly sought to fight for the Islamic State, Abdurasul Hasanovich Juraboev, 24, worked in a gyro shop. The other, Akhror Saidakhmetov, 19, worked at cellphone repair kiosks owned by the third man charged, Abror Habibov, 30.

All three were immigrants from former Soviet republics, and though Mr. Juraboev and Mr. Saidakhmetov had become permanent United States residents, all of them remained citizens of their native countries, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan.

In online postings, the two younger men seem to be searching for meaning in their lives, and increasingly disillusioned by those around them — including Muslim relatives they see as living less than devout lives.

The case against the three men relies in part on a confidential informant paid by the government, court documents show. Defense lawyers have criticized the government’s use of informers in similar cases, saying they may lure targets into making extreme plans or statements And in some cases, the threat has turned out to be overstated.

Still, coming just days after authorities in London said they were looking for three teenage girls who are suspected of traveling to Syria to join jihadists, the Brooklyn men’s arrests heightened concerns about the Islamic State.

Law enforcement officials are worried not only about what people might do if they make it to the faraway battlefields, but also about what they might do at home if they fail to get overseas.

“This is real,” William J. Bratton, the New York City police commissioner, said at a news conference. “This is the concern about the lone wolf.”

One of the men was arrested at Kennedy Airport, where the government says he was trying to board a flight to Istanbul and then planned to travel to Syria to join the battle.

At least two of the men had threatened to carry out attacks on targets in the United States, including planting a bomb in Coney Island and killing President Obama, if they failed in their attempt to travel overseas, according to the government.

But their threats of violence had an “aspirational” quality to them, according to law enforcement officials, with no indication that the suspects were close to staging an attack, large or small.

Charged with providing material support to a foreign terrorist organization, Mr. Juraboev, an Uzbek, and Mr. Saidakhmetov, a Kazakh, appeared in Federal District Court in Brooklyn on Wednesday afternoon.

As they were led into court, the youthfulness of Mr. Juraboev and Mr. Saidakhmetov was striking. Both had shaggy brown hair and broad faces. Mr. Saidakhmetov wore a green hooded sweatshirt, jeans and red high-top sneakers, and Mr. Juraboev a knit cap, a gray hooded shirt and jeans.

Mr. Habibov, an Uzbek whose visa had expired, faces the same charge. He appeared on Wednesday morning in Federal District Court in Jacksonville, Fla., where he operates one of his cellphone repair kiosks.

On Wednesday before the arrests were announced, James B. Comey, the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, said the threat posed by sympathizers of the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, was escalating.

“I have homegrown violent extremist investigations in every single state,” Mr. Comey said in a speech in Washington.

The Islamic State, he said, “is putting out a siren song through their slick propaganda through social media that goes like this: ‘Troubled soul, come to the caliphate, you will live a life of glory, these are the apocalyptic end times, you will find a life of meaning here fighting for our so-called caliphate, and if you can’t come, kill somebody where you are.’ ”

The men charged on Wednesday appeared to fit that mold, according to court documents. They were influenced by videos posted online by the Islamic State, inspired by messages on social media and felt compelled to act after months of becoming increasingly radicalized.

The court documents show young men driven to travel thousands of miles to the Middle East after clashing at home with family members they considered infidels. One of the young men had his passport taken away by his mother, who had grown concerned about his behavior.

While the authorities would not say how long the men had lived in Brooklyn, they were fluent in English and did little to stand out.

The documents provide one of the most detailed accounts of the logistics involved in recruitment into the group, showing the young men wrestling with how to evade law enforcement, sneak across borders and communicate from afar with members of the Islamic State.

The chief of the F.B.I.’s New York division, Diego G. Rodriguez, appealed to members of the community and religious leaders to come forward if they fear someone is being radicalized.

Adam D. Perlmutter, a lawyer for Mr. Saidakhmetov, said the case “highlights everything that is wrong in how the Justice Department approaches these cases.”

“He was worked over extensively by a confidential informant, according to the complaint,” Mr. Perlmutter said.

DOCUMENT: COMPLAINT CHARGING 3 IN BROOKLYN WITH AIDING THE ISLAMIC STATE 

The federal agents’ investigation appears to have started with Mr. Juraboev and his online activities, detailed in the court documents.

On Aug. 8, 2014, a person whose Internet protocol address and alias matched those of Mr. Juraboev posted to Hilofatnews, an Uzbek-language website supportive of ISIS: “I am in USA now but we don’t have any arms. But is it possible to commit ourselves as dedicated martyrs anyway while here? What I’m saying is, to shoot Obama and then get shot ourselves, will it do?”

On Aug. 15, federal agents went to Mr. Juraboev’s Brooklyn home. He said he believed in the Islamic State’s agenda, would like to travel to Syria to fight on its behalf and would harm President Obama if he could, according to court papers.

In an interview with agents at his residence three days later, Mr. Juraboev said Mr. Saidakhmetov was a co-worker with similar views on the jihadists. Investigators found that in early August, Mr. Saidakhmetov had posted a message on Hilofatnews celebrating a massacre of Iraqi soldiers by Islamic State fighters.

For his part, Mr. Juraboev suspected after the interview that he was being watched, telling others that he might have trouble getting out of the country.

On Aug. 26, he emailed an administrator of a website affiliated with the Islamic State, asking how to travel overseas now that he was being monitored.

“I need to sneak out of here with extreme caution without being noticed by them,” Mr. Juraboev wrote.

The administrator of the website is identified as Abu Bakr Bagdodi Halifat Dovlati Islamiya, or “Bagdodi,” and the court documents say he is based in Iraq.

In late September, a paid informer posing as an Islamic State supporter approached Mr. Juraboev at a mosque and later that day met Mr. Saidakhmetov; all three spoke about traveling to Syria.

The conversations continued through the fall and winter. Law enforcement officials said investigators often sought to learn as much as they could by monitoring suspects before making arrests.

Eventually, Mr. Juraboev and Mr. Saidakhmetov bought tickets to Turkey, the flights scheduled for this month and next month.

Mr. Habibov, who employed Mr. Saidakhmetov, had promised to cover expenses for his trip, Mr. Saidakhmetov said in recorded conversations, and helped arrange some of the travel.

Soon after Mr. Saidakhmetov bought his ticket, he told the informer that “if they were detected at the airport, they could kill a police officer and use the officer’s gun to shoot other law enforcement officers that arrived on the scene,” court papers say.

The United States attorney for the Eastern District of New York, Loretta E. Lynch, said in a statement that the arrests underscored the continuing threat posed by the Islamic State, both at home and abroad. “The flow of foreign fighters to Syria represents an evolving threat to our country,” she said.