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Four accused of plotting to attack upstate Muslim community

Jan 23, 2019 12:30 pm
Martin Gold is reporting for The New York Times four young men were arrested Jan. 22, after a plot to attack the Muslim community of Islamberg, Delaware County, was uncovered. A remark made last week by a student in the lunchroom at Greece Odyssey Academy in Greece, NY, alarmed other students, and they reported the conversation to school officials. Following a brief investigation, authorities allege that four young men, all from suburban Rochester, had stockpiled nearly two dozen firearms and three homemade bombs as part of a plan to target the Muslim enclave, located 150 miles northwest of New York City. One of the four people charged is a juvenile. All four were charged with criminal possession of a weapon and conspiracy and are currently being held on bond. No federal terrorism charges have been filed. It was unclear how all four were linked or how they initially connected, although at least three of the four were boy scouts and the three adults had been enrolled at Monroe Community College in Rochester at various points during the last two years. Why the four chose to target Islamberg is unclear, although over the past several years the community has been threatened with violence by anti-Muslim groups and right-wing conspiracy theorists. Read the full story in The New York Times.