New York bomb suspects had "terrorist encyclopedia"

By Chris Francescani

NEW YORK | Mon Dec 31, 2012 1:06pm EST

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Police arrested a New York City couple in their apartment on Saturday after authorities investigating a credit card theft found a highly explosive compound, bomb-making manuals, a sawed-off shotgun and ammunition, officials said on Monday.

Morgan Gliedman, 27, and Aaron Greene, 31, are being charged with two counts of suspicion of criminal possession of a weapon, for the shotgun, court documents show.

One sheaf of papers found in the apartment had a cover page that read "The Terrorist Encyclopedia," according to court documents.

Greene has been arraigned and held without bail, according to a law enforcement official involved in the investigation, who was not authorized to discuss the ongoing investigation.

Gliedman had not yet been arraigned on Monday morning, said a spokeswoman for Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr.

Police went to the couple's Greenwich Village apartment Saturday to question Gliedman, the daughter of a prominent New York doctor, to investigate a credit card theft, according to a second law enforcement official.

At the apartment, detectives discovered a plastic bottle containing seven grams of Hexamethylene triperoxide diaminean, or HMTD, court documents show.

HMTD is commonly used in homemade bombs. The discovery prompted the evacuation of nearby buildings, the second source said.

Police also discovered a cache of bomb-making manuals and handwritten notebooks containing chemical formulas, the second source said.

Additionally, investigators recovered a 12-gauge Mossberg 500 shotgun, ammunition, nine high-capacity rifle magazines and a flare launcher, the second source said.

Law enforcement officials said Gliedman was the son of Paul Gliedman, director of radiation oncology at Beth Israel Hospital in Brooklyn.

Neither Gliedman nor his wife, Susyn Schops Gliedman, a Douglas Elliman realtor, returned calls for comment.

Morgan Gliedman studied creative writing at The School of The Art Institute of Chicago, according to her Facebook page, which contains a photo of Gliedman outside a pink dressing room, posing in a black, scoop-neck sweater and red checkered skirt.

Greene attended Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, according to the New York Post, which first reported the arrests.

The newspaper quoted a law enforcement source as saying that Greene was an Occupy Wall Street activist whose political views were "extreme."

Two spokesmen for Occupy Wall Street's New York chapter said they had no knowledge of Greene.

(Reporting by Chris Francescani; Editing by Daniel Trotta and Nick Zieminski)

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Florida man plotted New York terrorist attack, prosecutors say

1 of 2. Broward Sheriff's Office booking photograph shows Sheheryar Alam Qazi taken on November 29, 2012 and released to Reuters on December 18, 2012.

Credit: Reuters/Broward Sheriff's Office/Handout

By Zachary Fagenson

FORT LAUDERDALE, Florida | Tue Dec 18, 2012 7:31pm EST

FORT LAUDERDALE, Florida (Reuters) - A Pakistani-born man plotted to detonate a bomb in New York City to avenge the deaths of people killed by drone attacks in Afghanistan but failed to raise enough money to carry out the scheme, a federal prosecutor said on Tuesday.

Raees Alam Qazi, 20, was arrested along with his brother, Sheheryar Alam Qazi, 30, in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, on November 29. The brothers, both naturalized U.S. citizens, are charged with providing support to terrorists and conspiring to use a weapon of mass destruction.

Both have pleaded not guilty.

On Tuesday, prosecutors offered the first details about the alleged plot during a bail hearing in federal court.

Raees Alam Qazi traveled to New York from his home in Florida on November 23 with the hope of finding a job to make enough money to build an explosive, according to testimony from FBI Special Agent Kristine Holden.

The younger Qazi told investigators after his arrest that he rode around New York on a bike looking for targets but never chose one and returned home four days later after running out of money, prosecutor Karen Gilbert said.

Qazi, who spent his time in New York sleeping in a restaurant, a mosque and on public transportation, was arrested two days after he traveled home on a Greyhound bus.

His brother, a taxi cab driver, was described by prosecutors and investigators as aware of the possible attack, but they said Raees Alam Qazi intended to carry it out.

"The brother was supporting him, paying bills, providing a computer and a cellphone," Gilbert said.

The case against the brothers is based in part on evidence gathered during surveillance of their cellular telephones, according to court documents.

During recorded calls, Raees Alam Qazi asked about the size of crowds at Times Square, Wall Street and at some New York City theaters, Holden said.

In another conversation, Sheheryar Qazi described his brother as a "lone wolf, like the Times Square bomber," referring to Faisal Shahzad, who pleaded guilty two years ago to trying to set off a car bomb in Times Square.

The elder Qazi was also recorded saying that his brother "wasn't going to be in this world long."

In a search of a house where Raees Alam Qazi was living, authorities say they recovered a laptop computer that showed he had researched ingredients to make a shoe bomb. They also found disassembled remote-control car parts, which Gilbert said were possibly intended to make a remote-control detonator.

Daniel Ecarius, an attorney for Raees Alam Qazi, sought to have him released on bail on Tuesday, saying his client had no criminal history. He took issue with some of the translation of the taped telephone calls, which were recorded in Pashto, a language spoken in Pakistan, as well as Afghanistan.

However, a federal judge ordered Raees Alam Qazi held without bail, saying he was a flight risk.

If convicted, both of the men could face a sentence of 15 years in prison on the charge of conspiring to provide material support to terrorists.

The charge of conspiracy to use a weapon of mass destruction carries a potential maximum life sentence.

(Writing by Kevin Gray; Editing by Steve Orlofsky)

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