A husband and wife militant duo will spend nearly a decade in prison after each pleaded guilty to trying to provide material support to a terrorist organization.
Prosecutors say the man told a law enforcement officer posing as a terror sympathizer that he wanted to carry out a terrorist attack in the United States. Potential targets included the US Military Academy at West Point or against a university in upstate New York, where he frequently watched Reserve Officers Training Corps or ROTC cadet training.
James Bradley, 21, of the Bronx, was sentenced to 11 years in prison Thursday in Manhattan federal court. His wife, Arwa Muthana, 30, of Hoover, Alabama, was sentenced Friday to nine years in prison during proceedings before Judge Paul A. Engelmayer.
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The sentences came after they pleaded guilty in September, admitting they were supporters of the Islamic State group who tried to go to the Middle East to fight for the organization. They married in an Islamic marriage ceremony in January 2021, authorities said.
The couple were arrested on March 31, 2021 at the Port Newark-Elizabeth Marine Terminal gangway in New Jersey and held without bail. At the time, authorities said they planned to board a cargo ship that an undercover law enforcement officer told them was going to Yemen.
A New York couple has been sentenced to 10 years in prison for attempting to supply material to the Islamic State.
Bradley sought transit to the Middle East on a cargo ship because he feared he had been on a terrorist watch list, prosecutors said.
Authorities said that before their arrest, the couple distributed extremist content online, including images of Islamic State fighters, Osama bin Laden and terror attacks.
After Muthana was arrested, she told investigators she was willing to fight and kill Americans if it were up to God, prosecutors said.
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Her lawyers had asked Engelmayer to sentence her to time served, saying she was a woman “with no passport, little money and no real plan.” They said her actions were the result of an “abused and traumatized young woman trying to get as far away from her home as possible.”
Bradley’s attorneys also sought a sentence of time served.
Prosecutors had asked the judge to sentence each of them to at least 15 years in prison, saying it was necessary “to deter and prevent the defendants from resuming their activities in support of radical Islamic terrorist ideology, and to deter other who, like the defendants, seek to join and serve brutal terrorist organizations.”
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The US Parole Office had recommended that they each serve six years in prison. The office cited Bradley’s age, his family’s support and his involvement in deradicalization counseling.
