The Baltimore Sun, January 14, 2016
At least seven Marylanders have been charged with terrorism-related crimes in recent years:
Maalik Alim Jones, formerly of Windsor Mill, was indicted on charges of supporting and receiving military training from an African terrorist group connected with al-Qaida. The 31-year-old pleaded not guilty Wednesday and his lawyer said he will fight the charges. Jones, a U.S. citizen, left Baltimore in 2011 and traveled to Somalia, where he was taken to an al-Shabab training camp, according to the indictment. He allegedly took part in a battle in the Somali town of Afmadow against Kenyan soldiers.
Mohamed Elshinawy, 30, of Edgewood, was arrested in December on charges of attempting to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization. Federal prosecutors said the Harford County man pledged allegiance to the self-proclaimed Islamic State and received thousands of dollars from overseas to carry out an attack. The FBI says in court documents that Elshinawy told investigators he was scamming his terrorist contacts and milking them for money. Prosecutors say that was a lie and that Elshinawy was actually trying to cover his tracks. Prosecutors said Thursday Elshinawy has been indicted by a federal grand jury. If convicted, he could be sentenced to decades in prison.
Mohammad Hassan Khalid, a teenager from Ellicott City, was sentenced in 2014 to five years in prison for his involvement in a plot with Colleen LaRose, known as "Jihad Jane," to kill a Swedish cartoonist who had drawn the head of the prophet Muhammad on the body of a dog. Khalid became one of the youngest people ever convicted in federal court of conspiracy to aid terrorists. He graduated from Mount Hebron High School in 2011 with a full math and science scholarship to the Johns Hopkins University.
Craig Benedict Baxam, an Army private from Laurel, pleaded guilty in January 2014 to destroying his computer in an attempt to cover his tracks before flying to Africa in a bid to join al-Shabab. The 2005 Laurel High School graduate was sentenced to seven years in prison on the charge of destroying records he thought could be used in a terrorism investigation.
Antonio Benjamin Martinez, who lived in Gwynn Oak and Windsor Mill, pleaded guilty in February 2012 to attempting to use a weapon of mass destruction in the failed 2010 bombing of the Armed Forces Career Center in Catonsville. Martinez was sentenced to 25 years in federal prison.
Majid Shoukat Khan, a 1999 graduate of Owings Mills High School, pleaded guilty in February 2012 to murder, espionage and conspiracy for his role in the deadly 2003 bombing of a hotel in Indonesia and plots to assassinate Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf and blow up gas stations in the United States. A native of Pakistan who landed in Catonsville, Khan agreed to testify against other terror suspects in exchange for 19-year sentence.
Mahmud F. Brent, a former cabdriver from Baltimore, was sentenced in July 2007 to 15 years in prison for providing of material support to a terrorist organization. In 2002, Brent attended a training camp in Pakistan that was run by the Lashkar-e-Tayyaba, an Islamic extremist group whose name roughly translates as "Army of the Pure." [Source: Baltimore Sun reports]
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