[Jahness]

FBI Says LA County men (2 black, 1 Latino) Planned a Terrorist Plot

[LA Times]

FBI Affidavit Details Terrorist Plot
Unsealed documents list 20 targets selected to retaliate for war in Iraq.
Men robbed gas stations to finance the planned attacks, authorities say.

By Andrew Blankstein and Greg Krikorian
Times Staff Writers

September 23, 2005

Three Los Angeles County men plotted to inflict 35 to 40 casualties in
a jihad against Southern California military installations to avenge the
U.S. war in Iraq and the mistreatment of Muslim prisoners at Guantanamo
Bay, Cuba, according to a federal affidavit.

Levar Haney Washington, 25, and Gregory Vernon Patterson and Hammad
Riaz Samana, both 21, have been in custody since midsummer.

Before their arrests, they targeted 10 Army recruitment centers around
Los Angeles County in the first phase of an alleged terrorist plot,
according to the FBI affidavit filed in support of the charges against
Samana.

All told, 20 possible targets — including two military installations in
West Los Angeles, 18 Army recruitment centers and an Army ball
— were allegedly chosen by the conspirators, court documents said.

Investigators later confirmed that a ball was scheduled to take place
at the location but not on the date cited by the men. The document
makes no mention of synagogues, the Israeli Consulate or other places
investigators previously said were among the men's targets.

Washington and Patterson were arrested in July by Torrance police in
connection with a string of armed robberies at gas stations.

A month later, federal authorities picked up Samana, whom they accused
of joining in the alleged robberies to finance the attacks.

Earlier this month, the men, along with Kevin Lamar James, who is in
prison, were indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of conspiracy
to levy war against the U.S. government through terrorism. The affidavit,
which was recently unsealed by the court, offers new details of the
alleged conspiracy and alleges that the suspects admitted to large
portions of the plot in interviews with FBI and anti-terrorism agents.

According to the affidavit, Washington told agents from the FBI and the
Joint Terrorism Task Force, a local law enforcement group, that he was
the head of an Islamic council that met twice a week to plan a jihad
against the U.S.

Washington said the council was formed to "respond to the oppression of
Muslims in Iraq and Afghanistan by the U.S. government" and that the
plan was to carry out two operations in the Los Angeles area, the first
targeting the recruitment centers, FBI Special Agent James Clinton
Judd, the affidavit's author, wrote.

Washington said the council had conducted reconnaissance on the
targets, evaluating "whether a bomb would be feasible or whether it
would be better to use rifles and inflict as many casualties as possible,
" the affidavit said. He also told investigators that planning for the
attacks was almost complete, the affidavit said.

Patterson allegedly told law enforcement authorities that the gas
station robberies were part of the jihad against the U.S., "particularly
against American oil companies who are stealing from 'our countries,' i.e.
Muslim countries," Judd wrote. "The ultimate goal is to die for Allah in a
jihad," Patterson told investigators, the affidavit said.

Patterson said he recently used money from the gas station holdups to
buy a .223-caliber rifle for the alleged attacks, Judd added.

In his interview with the FBI, Samana said he shared Washington's view
that "something must be done to punish the United States."

Samana said he wrote a document titled "Mode of Attack" between July 1
and July 6, 2005, and that Washington told him that he wanted to
research several locations "suitable for an attack."

On July 4, Samana, Washington and Patterson conducted target shooting
at a park in Los Angeles.

The weapon matched the description of one used in a Fullerton armed
robbery, the affidavit said.

Patterson's lawyer, Winston McKesson, said his client did not want him
to comment on the specifics of the case.

"However," McKesson said, "I do want to say that he has been and he
continues to be a deeply religious person, and it is not his desire to
have any harm come to this country."

Attorneys for the other men could not be reached for comment.

Authorities have alleged that the plot was hatched by James, 29, a
prisoner at the California State Prison in Sacramento and purported
founder of a radical Islamic prison gang known as Jamiyyat Ul Islam Is
Saheeh, or the Assembly of Authentic Islam.

During a brief news conference at the Federal Building in Westwood, FBI
Director Robert S. Mueller III called the Torrance case the most
significant prison-based plot uncovered by authorities in years,
significant because the suspects were actually planning an attack, he
added.

"I wouldn't go so far as to say … that we have had no others that came
to the same level of specificity, because we have," Mueller told
reporters.

"But there were specifics here that caused us some concern…. [The
defendants] were pretty far advanced in terms of identifying targets,
and that makes it in a class with one or two" other cases.

In recent weeks, prompted largely by the California case, the FBI has
launched a new initiative to monitor prisons nationwide to forestall
the possibility of inmates working among themselves or with outsiders to
plan terrorist attacks.

With three of the four defendants born and raised in the U.S., Mueller
said the case pointed up the potential of home-grown terrorism.

"We have not forgotten the Oklahoma City bombing. One cannot forget the
anthrax attacks," Mueller said. "We have since Sept. 11 understood that
there was a threat to the United States from international terrorist
groups from outside the United States. We have not for a moment
forgotten

… the fact that domestic terrorists could very easily be capable of the
same kind of attack."