Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
Download MP3
A man has been charged with terrorism-related offenses that include plotting to kill people in an American shopping mall, the US Justice Department says. Tarek Mehanna, 27, was held in Sudbury, a suburb of Boston, Massachusetts, and charged with conspiracy to provide material support to terrorists. He is also accused of conspiring to kill people overseas and of seeking terrorist training in the Middle East. At least two other co-conspirators were involved, officials said. The World’s Matthew Bell reports.
Read the Transcript
This text below is a phonetic transcript of a radio story broadcast by PRI’s THE WORLD. It has been created on deadline by a contractor for PRI. The transcript is included here to facilitate internet searches for audio content. Please report any transcribing errors to theworld@pri.org. This transcript may not be in its final form, and it may be updated. Please be aware that the authoritative record of material distributed by PRI’s THE WORLD is the program audio.
MARCO WERMAN: There was a reminder today that terrorism is not just a threat outside the United States. Federal authorities announced the arrest of a 27-year-old man at his parents’ home in a Boston suburb. The man is accused of plotting to carry out a terrorist attack on US soil. The World’s Matthew Bell has details.
MATTHEW BELL: An FBI search warrant details the government’s case against 27-year-old Tarek Mehanna of Sudbury, Massachusetts. It says Mehanna has been talking about and planning violent jihad for years going back to before the attacks of September 11th. It says he traveled to Yemen in 2004 to take part in terrorist training and then he lied about the trip to the FBI in 2006. The most chilling allegation from the government says in 2003 Mehanna and several other men planned to kill people at a shopping mall here in the US. Justice Department spokesman Michael Loucks announced the arrest of Mehanna today in Boston. Loucks said Mehanna and his co-conspirators tried to get automatic weapons from a reputed gang member named Daniel Maldonado.
MICHAEL LOUCKS: They had discussions as I said regarding how to do it; whether to do it from multiple entrances; what to do when emergency responders arrive. And one of them took the step to go to Maldonado to try to utilize his, what they believed to be his gang contacts to obtain automatic weapons. It ended, so far as alleged, when Maldonado indicated all he could obtain for them were handguns. And then that member of the group reported back to the rest of them that they couldn’t obtain automatic weapons and they determined it was no feasible to go forward.
BELL: Government documents say the evidence against Mehanna includes testimony from at least two of his former co-conspirators along with taped telephone conversations. If the allegations and the FBI search warrant are true, Mehanna appears to be someone who was radicalized some years ago but not very successful in carrying out his violent plans.
BRUCE HOFFMAN: He’s I think one step beyond the wannabe but not quite the full step to the full-fledged terrorist.
BELL: Bruce Hoffman is a terrorism expert at Georgetown University. He says the most worrisome thing about this arrest is that it’s just the latest in a recent string of foiled terrorist plots here in the US.
BRUCE HOFFMAN: For many years the United States thought that this problem of homegrown terrorism was a phenomena that happened somewhere else that was restricted to Europe or perhaps South Asia but that wouldn’t affect the United States for a variety of socio-economic reasons. I think what we’re finding now is that there are more of these people at least that have been radicalized and unfortunately more that have become violently inclined.
BELL: This arrest comes less than a month after the arrest of Najibullah Zazi. He received terrorist training overseas and he’s accused of plotting a bomb attack in the US. Tarek Mehanna on the other hand appears to have tried but ultimately failed to attend the terrorist training camp in Yemen. For The World I’m Matthew Bell.
Copyright ©2009 PRI’s THE WORLD. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to PRI’s THE WORLD. This transcript may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, without prior written permission. For further information, please email The World’s Permissions Coordinator at theworld@pri.org.
Discussion
No comments for “Boston terrorism arrest”