Homeland Security News

Brittany Nicole Adams, 29, of Landover, MD, and Anthony Benson, Jr., 30, of Washington, D.C., have been indicted and arrested for conspiracy to distribute explosive devices and three counts of distribution of explosive devices. The charges were filed in an indictment unsealed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, announced U.S. Attorney Michael R. Sherwin and Ashan M. Benedict, Special Agent in Charge of the Washington Field Division of the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF).

            The investigation began after ATF identified advertisements on a website that offered for sale explosive devices described as “Dynamite,” and available for local pickup in Washington, D.C.  An undercover agent responded to the ad and arranged to meet with the seller at a predetermined location in Washington, D.C.  In June of 2020, ATF agents conducted an undercover controlled purchase of suspected explosive devices after Adams and Benson met with the undercover agent in response to communication related to the sale advertisement.  At the meeting, Adams provided the undercover agent with eleven suspected illegal explosive devices in exchange for U.S. currency.  Subsequently, on two additional occasions in July of 2020, Adams and Benson met with the undercover agent and again provided to the undercover agent illegal explosive devices in exchange for U.S. currency. 

Read more: Department of Justice

Renewed hostilities have been raging between Armenian and Azerbaijani forces around the contested territory of Nagorno-Karabakh in the southern Caucasus.

In scale and scope, the fighting that broke out on Sunday surpasses the periodic escalations of recent years, involving heavy artillery, tanks, missiles and drones.

So far there are more than 100 confirmed deaths among civilians and Armenian combatants killed in action. Azerbaijan does not release data on its military losses, but these can be assumed to be at least as high.

The fighting appears to be driven by an attempt by Azerbaijani forces to recapture swathes of territories occupied by Armenian forces in the Karabakh war after the Soviet Union collapsed. Hundreds of thousands of ethnic Azeris were displaced from these areas in 1992-4.

Read more: BBC News

Saudi Arabia on Monday said it broke up a terrorist cell that had received training from Iran's Revolutionary Guards, arresting 10 people and seizing weapons and explosives.

The arrests were made last week after a probe uncovered the suspects' identities and two hideouts: a house and a farm, according to a statement made by the Presidency of State Security, a Saudi intelligence body.

The spokesman for the Presidency of State Security said in a statement that three of those arrested had been trained in Iran and had received "military and field training including on how to make explosives" between October and December 2017 at sites linked to the Revolutionary Guards in Iran.

The other seven suspects were linked to the group in different roles, according to the statement, which was carried by the official Saudi Press Agency.

Read more: Deutsche Welle

A father and son, part of a family of seven who left the United States to join Islamic State in Syria, are back on U.S. soil, charged with supporting the terror group.

Emraan Ali, 53, and his 19-year-old son Jihad appeared in federal court in Florida on Tuesday, charged with material support violations.

According to court documents, the pair surrendered to the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) near Baghuz, Syria, in March 2019, as the terror group’s final stronghold collapsed.

Another minor son, identified only as I.M.A., was with them at the time, but U.S. officials have yet to comment on his whereabouts or those of other family members, including a sister who was married to a British IS fighter and had his child when she was just 15.

Read more: Voice of America

20-year-old Ethan Sandomire a resident of Honolulu, Hawaii, was indicted by a federal grand jury on Wednesday with possessing and attempting to possess a chemical weapon, and possessing an unregistered destructive device.

According to the indictment and other court documents, between approximately December 2019 and March 2020, Sandomire conducted extensive research into explosives, explosive devices, chemical and biological weapons, and related topics, and wrote privately about his plans for explosive and chemical attacks in and around Honolulu, Hawaii.

In early 2020, Sandomire ordered the materials to make a destructive device from multiple online vendors, which were then delivered to his residence.  At or around the time of Sandomire’s arrest on March 29, 2020, the FBI seized the items that Sandomire had ordered online from a separate location, including, among other things: approximately 30 pounds of aluminum powder, approximately 30 pounds of ultra-pure potassium perchlorate, approximately 45 pounds of potassium perchlorate, and multiple ignition systems, wireless firing systems, and victim-initiated tripwire systems.

Read more: KITV (Hawaii)