International Journal on Criminology Volume 4, Number 2, Winter 2016 | Page 4
International Journal on Criminology
Well-documented examples of this activity include the following:
-----The case of Abdel Hameed Shehadah, who traveled to Pakistan
in 2008 for jihadi training, but was turned back by authorities based on
intelligence provided by an NYPD undercover officer.
-----The case of Almonte and Alessa who were about to join al-Shabab
when arrested at JFK airport in 2010; a joint case with the FBI and a model
of collaboration, an NYPD undercover officer was central to its success.
-----The 2013 case of Justin Kaliebe and Marcos “ali” Zea, both planning
to join AQAP before they were arrested, Kaliebe at JFK Airport and Zea at
home; this was another joint NYPD–FBI case using NYPD undercover and
confidential informant assets.
In these and similar cases, the Intelligence Division believed each of these persons
would have been trained overseas and eventually returned to New York City to carry
out an attack on behalf of their terrorist benefactors.
-----This was the case of Najibullah Zazzi and his al-Qaeda trained
cohorts, Zarien Ahmedzay and Adis Medunjanin, who trained in Pakistan in
2008 and returned to NewYork City to attack the subway system days after
the eighth anniversary of 9/11.
-----Another example is Faisal Shahzad, a Connecticut resident who
attempted to detonate a car bomb in Times Square on 1 May 2010 after being
trained in a Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan [TTP] training camp.
The Intelligence Division also placed heavy emphasis on detecting and
deterring agents of radicalization. In this regard, the Division was early
in targeting the Internet and later social media as mechanisms for inciting
radicalization to violence.
-----A prime example is the Revolutionary Muslim case—a radicalizing
website started in Brooklyn in 2007 by Younes Abdullah Mohammed and
Yousef al-Khattab, both of whom were under investigation by the NYPD
Intelligence Division.
-----In 2012 Younes was arrested and sentenced to 10 years in prison in
a joint effort between the Intelligence Division, the FBI Washington Field
Office, and the Eastern District of Virginia U.S. Attorney’s Office.
----- Before Younes, who was under investigation by the Intelligence
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