A former Mercer County resident admitted Monday that he tried to join a Somalian-based terrorist organization to target “evil America” in 2023, authorities said.
Karrem Nasr, 24, a U.S. citizen who previously lived in Lawrenceville, pleaded guilty to attempting to provide material support to a designated foreign terrorist organization, according to a release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office District of Southern New York.
Nasr moved from New Jersey to Egypt in July 2023 and is a supporter of al Shabaab, a designated foreign terrorist organization that has attacked Americans and American allies, the office said.
Motivated by the Oct. 7 Hamas terrorist attack in Israel, he repeatedly expressed his desire in communications, and his plans to join al Shabaab and wage jihad, federal prosecutors said.
Nasr unknowingly sent some of those communications to an FBI confidential source who was posing as a facilitator for terrorist organizations, investigators said.
Nasr told both the source and said in online postings that he had been thinking of engaging in jihad for a long time. He said he was particularly motivated by the Hamas violence in Israel, officials said.
He told the source that the number one enemy was “evil America,” which he called the “head of the snake,” according to the release.
In public social media posts made in 2023, he warned that “Jihad” was “coming soon to a US location near you,” posting airplane, bomb, and fire emojis, the office said.
He later told the source he planned to join al Shabaab to receive military training and engage in jihad, that he was prepared to kill and be killed, and that he specifically wanted to be a martyr for the jihadist cause, authorities said.
Nasr made flight and lodging reservations for travel to Kenya, where he planned to meet members of al Shabaab for additional travel to Somalia to join and train with the group, federal prosecutors said.
He booked a flight for Dec. 14, 2023, from Egypt to Kenya and the day before his flight, he told the source that he planned to delete data from his cellphone and computer to ensure that if he were detained, police would not be able to recover evidence, officials said.
After flying to Kenya, he was taken into custody by Kenyan authorities, authorities said.
“Now, instead of perpetrating a deadly attack in the name of a foreign terrorist group, Nasr resides in federal prison,” U.S. Attorney Danielle R. Sassoon said in a statement. “I thank the career prosecutors of my office and our law enforcement partners for their extraordinary work in disrupting this plan and bringing a terrorist to justice.”
Following his guilty plea, Nasr now faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.
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