NEW YORK (WCBS 880) --A 22-year-old man pleaded guilty to plotting terrorist attacks in Queens in support of ISIS, the Department of Justice announced Friday.
Awais Chudhary, a naturalized U.S. citizen born in Pakistan, pleaded guilty to the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham, a designated foreign terrorist organization.
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“Awais Chudhary has admitted to planning to carry out a lone wolf terrorist attack in Queens against innocent civilians in an embrace of ISIS’s murderous cause,” United States Attorney Breon Peace said.
According to court filings, after watching violent terrorist propaganda videos in August 2019, Chudhary pledged his allegiance to ISIS’s then-leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and began planning for a knife or bomb attack as a lone wolf ISIS supporter.
Officials said Chudhary identified targets, including the pedestrian bridges over the Grand Central Parkway and the Flushing Bay Promenade, where he intended to carry out the attacks.
Chudhary sought guidance from individuals whom he believed to be ISIS supporters, including what type of knife to use and how to prevent detection from law enforcement by not leaving “traces of finger prints [or] DNA,” Peace added.
He also sent a screenshot of a document from an ISIS propaganda magazine that included a diagram of the human body depicting where to stab victims with a knife and conducted several reconnaissance trips to these locations and made video recordings of the areas he intended to attack.
Chudhary ordered items online that he intended to use to commit a terrorist attack, including a tactical knife, a mask, gloves, and a cellphone chest and head strap to facilitate his recording of the attack, which he hoped would serve as inspiration to other ISIS supporters.
“Mr. Chudhary has admitted to providing material support, from American soil, to terrorists based overseas,” stated NYPD Commissioner Sewell. “He is a naturalized U.S. citizen who abandoned the country that took him in, and instead pledged allegiance to ISIS and repeatedly and diligently promoted its violent objectives. Clearly, the threat of ISIS-inspired terrorism remains very real, and the members of our FBI-NYPD Joint Terrorism Task Force will never stop working to identify anyone aiding groups that consider our country their sworn enemy.”
He was arrested as he attempted to retrieve the items from an online retailer’s locker in Queens.
When sentenced, Chudhary faces up to 20 years in prison.
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