NYC terror attack apparently was set for Sept 11

Saturday 26th September, 05:55 AM JST

DENVER —

An Afghan immigrant wanted to carry out a New York City terror attack involving hydrogen peroxide bombs to coincide with the Sept 11, 2001 anniversary before federal authorities foiled the plan, a U.S. prosecutor said Friday.

Tim Neff told a federal judge that Najibullah Zazi “was in the throes of making a bomb and attempting to perfect his formulation.”

“The evidence suggests a chilling, disturbing sequence of events showing the defendant was intent on making a bomb and being in New York on 9/11, for purposes of perhaps using such items,” Neff declared in arguing for Zazi’s transfer to New York.

Ken Deal, the chief deputy U.S. marshal in Denver, said Zazi was put on a U.S. government plane and flown out of southern Denver’s Centennial Airport on Friday afternoon, little more than an hour after U.S. Magistrate Judge Craig Shaffer ordered Zazi transferred to New York City to face charges of conspiracy to use weapons of mass destruction.

Deal said it was possible Zazi could appear in federal court in Brooklyn late Friday. The charge against Zazi carries a possible life sentence upon conviction.

Zazi, a 24-year-old Afghan-born coffee cart owner in New York and Denver airport shuttle driver, sat expressionless during the Denver court hearing, staring at a decanter on the defense table.

Zazi’s attorney, Arthur Folsom, argued at the hearing that Zazi should be released on bond with electronic monitoring. He said Zazi has family ties in Colorado: His parents and five siblings.

“If that’s not an indication of strong family ties to the state of Colorado, I don’t know what is,” Folsom said.

Shaffer disagreed, saying Zazi had been in Colorado less than a year. “He has very little reason to stay,” the judge said.

Zazi has publicly denied being a terrorist since he was arrested on Saturday and charged with lying to FBI agents during three days of voluntary interviews. That count was considered a holding charge pending Thursday’s indictment.

The U.S. indictment says Zazi received explosives training from al-Qaida and bought large quantities of hydrogen peroxide and nail-polish remover at beauty supply stores to make bombs, possibly to detonate on New York City commuter trains.

Investigators have fanned out across the Denver area and New York City, going to beauty shops, home improvement stores and neighborhoods Zazi frequented looking for possible accomplices, while the government issued national terrorism warnings for sports complexes, hotels and transit systems.

A law enforcement official told The Associated Press on Thursday that Zazi had associates in New York who were in on the plot. Court papers say that during the summer, Zazi and three unidentified associates bought “unusually large quantities” of hydrogen peroxide and acetone—a flammable solvent found in nail-polish remover—from beauty supply stores in the Denver area, products with names like Ion Sensitive Scalp Developer and Clairoxide.

Zazi searched a Queens home improvement store Web site for another ingredient needed to make a compound called TATP (Triacetone Triperoxide), the explosives used in the London bombings that killed over 50 people, prosecutors said.

A government motion seeking to deny bail laid out a chronology of the alleged scheme, which prosecutors said had been in the works for more than a year.

Zazi—a legal U.S. resident who immigrated in 1999—began plotting as early as August 2008 to “use one or more weapons of mass destruction,” when he “and others” traveled from Newark, New Jersey, to receive explosives training in Pakistan, prosecutors said.

Within days of returning from Pakistan in early 2009, he moved to the Denver suburb of Aurora, where he used a computer to research homemade bomb ingredients and to look up beauty supply stores where he could buy them, according to prosecutors.

A second law enforcement official who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the ongoing investigation said associates of Zazi visited Colorado from New York to help him buy the chemicals, using stolen credit cards to make the purchases before returning to New York.

Security video and receipts show that some of the purchases were made near a Colorado hotel, according to court papers. On Sept 6 and 7, Zazi checked into a suite at the hotel with a kitchen and a stove, the papers say, and tried to contact an unidentified associate “seeking to correct mixtures of ingredients to make explosives.”

“Zazi repeatedly emphasized in the communications that he needed the answers right away,” the papers said. “Each communication” was “more urgent than the last.”

FBI explosives testing later found residue in the vent above the stove, authorities said.

On Sept 8, court papers say, Zazi searched the Internet for home improvement stores in Queens before driving a rental car for a two-day trip to the city. The visit triggered a series of searches in Denver and New York City over the past two weeks, and netted backpacks, cell phones and a scale at a Queens home where Zazi spent the night.

A law enforcement official said Thursday that authorities had been especially worried about Zazi’s Sept 10 visit to the city because it coincided with a visit by President Barack Obama, and considered arresting him right away. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the investigation continues.

Beauty supply store employees in New York and the Denver suburbs said authorities had been asking whether anyone had come in buying a lot of hydrogen peroxide or acetone.

At Beauty Supply Warehouse in suburban Denver, Paul Phillips said a co-worker told investigators he had sold chemicals to Zazi. Company president Karan Hoss said the firm turned over security video of a man matching Zazi’s description to the FBI. A check of sales found that someone bought a dozen 32-ounce bottles of a hydrogen peroxide product in July. More was purchased in late August, Hoss said.

Zazi’s father, Mohammed Wali Zazi, and a New York City imam, Ahmad Wais Afzali, appeared in court Thursday on charges they lied to investigators. Mohammed Zazi, 53, was ordered freed under court supervision in Denver until an Oct 9 hearing. Afzali, who was accused of tipping off the Zazis to the federal probe against them in a tapped telephone call, was released in New York on $1.5 million bail.

___

Associated Press writers Tom Hays and Samantha Gross in New York and Devlin Barrett in Washington contributed to this report.

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Latest 15 of 24 Total Comments Show All

LIBERTAS at 05:11 PM JST - 26th September

“The evidence suggests a chilling, disturbing sequence of events showing the defendant was intent on making a bomb and being in New York on 9/11, for purposes of perhaps using such items,”

Now, it appears that the FBI can arrest someone for thinking about doing something. If my family had been wiped out by drone attacks, I'd be thinking too. Does that me a terrorist?
kinniku at 07:06 PM JST - 26th September

Libertas,

No, it appears you have trouble reading articles in English...the accused used stolen credit cards to buy ingredients and even researched bomb making on the internet. He even (let me help you,from the article above)'tried to contact an unidentified associate “seeking to correct mixtures of ingredients to make explosives.” “Zazi repeatedly emphasized in the communications that he needed the answers right away,” the papers said. “Each communication” was “more urgent than the last.”'

This was, you know, after being trained in bomb making. I know English is a difficult language, but perhaps you might want to consider a phonics lesson or two before commenting in a way that makes it look like you haven't even seen the article above...
kinniku at 07:07 PM JST - 26th September

ETA: the accused is alledged to have done the things listed in the article above. Obviously a person should and must be considered innocent until proven guilty in a trial.
LIBERTAS at 09:30 PM JST - 26th September

Techy today, aren't we? I don't believe for one minute that this scenario played out as we've been told it. Too much booga booga goes on in the US media, all in its attempt to manufacture consent for a new war. What saved the US economy after WWI? Why WWII of course! And the couch potato nation will continue its one-finger remote-control aerobics while it is conned yet again by law-enforement spokesperson(s) who speak on condition of anonymity. Pathetic. Bill Maher said it well, "If America can't get its act together, it must lose the bald eagle as our symbol and replace it with the YouTube video of the puppy that can't get up. As long as we're pathetic, we might as well act like it's cute."
MeanRingo at 10:21 PM JST - 26th September

So once again Obama and his gov't protect the US like GWB and his gov't couldn't. Way to go! Now if GWB hadn't created an endless queue of crazed lunatics bent on blowing a portion of the US up in order to get revenge, well, I don't know if it would ever have been proven.
Taka313 at 11:44 PM JST - 26th September

The same people here who are screeching, "See, there really ARE terrorists under the bed and in the closet" are the same people who join the teabaggers in complaining about too much government, while ignoring that that government, with the help of taxpayer money, is what caught these people.

There's simply no consistency in any of their arguments, other than self-entitlement, hatred, volume and stupidity.

Taka
adaydream at 11:59 PM JST - 26th September

LIBERTAS

Now, it appears that the FBI can arrest someone for thinking about doing something.

I'm one of these liberal minded individuals who expects the freedoms allowed under our laws to the fullest extent. But these people went farther than just talking and opinion exchanging. They were actually buying stuff, doing illegal acts and putting their talking into actions.

The FBI and other agencies must be applauded for seeing what was going on, chasing down the leads and stopping an act against our country that would have harmed many people. < :-)
SuperLib at 12:18 AM JST - 27th September

LIBERTAS: I don't believe for one minute that this scenario played out as we've been told it. Too much booga booga goes on in the US media, all in its attempt to manufacture consent for a new war. What saved the US economy after WWI? Why WWII of course! And the couch potato nation will continue its one-finger remote-control aerobics while it is conned yet again by law-enforement spokesperson(s) who speak on condition of anonymity. Pathetic. Bill Maher said it well,

So you start off with some argument where you feel "booga booga" is convincing evidence, then you follow it up with a blanket insult on all Americans. Way to be, man, way to be.
Taka313 at 12:35 AM JST - 27th September

Way to be, man, way to be.

When you're right; you're right. That reply cracked me up!

Taka
LIBERTAS at 02:36 AM JST - 27th September

OBL has W O N! Don't you guys get it yet? You're bankrupt, on SO many levels!
RomeoRamenII at 03:07 AM JST - 27th September

Let's just be thankfull the secret services are on the ball blah, blah, blah .....

When a republican was presisent, global liberals dismissed actions like this as "fearmongering", and "booga booga". Now, they say that the U.S. government is doing a great job.

Ah, the hypocrisy.

you were screeching that the US, under President Obama, wouldn't be safe from terrorists

Obama's been worse than asleep at the wheel on the issue of terrorism. His only action to date has been to cripple the CIA and make us far more vulnerable. His only saving grace is that he hasn't traded a terrorist for oil like your nation did, Adverts.
adaydream at 04:12 AM JST - 27th September

RomeoRamenII

When a republican was presisent, global liberals dismissed actions like this as "fearmongering", and "booga booga". Now, they say that the U.S. government is doing a great job.

When bush was in office he sent the CIA and the FBI off on wild goose chases. Remember 'we know where the WMD are!' And raising the terror alert before an election and the whole fiasco? dick cheney spending enormous hours at the Pentagon trying to fluff up some cock-a-mammy crap. If george bush could have had some creditability then he might have been taken serious, but he didn't.

Thing different is Obama didn't have his hands in this at all. The FBI and other agencies discovered this, they handled it and they weren't blindsided with garbage in an attempt to boaster Obama's creditability as a war president.

Maybe if bush hadn't allowed the US to get attacked by suppressing information. If he/cheney/feith hadn't made up the WMD trash. If he hadn't sent Powell off to the UN with those glossies. bush and the republicans did that to themselves.

My brother has retired from the military now, but he's still as republican as he always has been and still as involved (double dipping). I remember during the run up to the george bush Memorial War in Iraq his saying, "If you'd seen all the evidence that I've seen..." Well I have and there was none. No evidence that should have gotten us into Iraq. So there's a real good reason that the republican presidents weren't taken serious by the democrats. < :-)
kinniku at 09:10 AM JST - 27th September

Libertas,

Don't you guys get it yet?

Yes, we get it. We get that you don't seem to know what you are talking about.
Taka313 at 09:39 AM JST - 27th September

ramen,

Thanks for bolding your post. That allows me to put a check in the "screeching" box.

Try to be a little less predictable, k?

Taka
Madverts at 03:59 PM JST - 28th September

"His only action to date has been to cripple the CIA and make us far more vulnerable"

Heh, by them catching terrorists before they act?

"When a republican was presisent, global liberals dismissed actions like this as "fearmongering""

The same Republican president that was asleep at the wheel whist somebody perpetrated the worst and most hideous attrocity on American soil ever?

Heh. Good argument you have there.