FBI Arrests National Guardsman and His Cousin For Trying to Join ISIS
Federal authorities late yesterday arrested Spc. Hasan Edmonds, 22, a Illinois Army National Guard soldier, and his cousin Jonas, 29, for attempting to join the Islamic State's anti-Western jihad, according to the Chicago Sun-Times.
Hasan Edmonds, who is apparently a current reservist, was apprehended while attempting to board a flight from Chicago's Midway Airport to Cairo, Egypt, in hopes that he could link up with the ISIS terrorists and join their hordes in Syria and Iraq, authorities told the Sun-Times. Jonas was taken peacefully in his suburban home in Aurora.
The paper explains the alleged plot as it was related by authorities:
Hasan Edmonds planned to use his military training to fight on behalf of ISIL, while Jonas "planned to carry out an act of terrorism in the United States after Hasan Edmonds departed.," the feds say.
They met with an FBI undercover employee and "presented a plan to carry out an armed attack against a U.S. military facility in northern Illinois, an installation where Hasan Edmonds had been training," the feds say.
ABC News, which says the pair "first came onto the FBI's radar in late 2014," reports that the pair will appear later today in a federal court.