A teenager planned to attack churches in a northern Idaho city using a metal pipe, butane fuel, a machete and, if he could get them, his father’s guns, according to federal prosecutors who charged him with attempting to provide material support to the Islamic State group.
Quick Read
- Planned Attack in Idaho: Alexander Scott Mercurio, 18, plotted an attack on churches in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, using a metal pipe, butane fuel, a machete, and potentially his father’s guns.
- Islamic State Group Support: Charged with attempting to provide material support to the Islamic State group, a designated terrorist organization, Mercurio was in communication with FBI informants pretending to be supporters of the group.
- Arrest and Charges: Mercurio was apprehended on the eve of the planned attack, with federal prosecutors bringing charges against him for his intentions to support the Islamic State group’s activities.
- Preparation and Intent: Despite his Christian upbringing, Mercurio, who converted to Islam, expressed intent to carry out the attack with or without firearms, planning to disable his father to access the weapons.
- Extensive Planning: Over two years, Mercurio engaged with confidential informants, discussing his plans and even attempting to construct an explosive vest for the attacks.
- Ideological Shift: Mercurio detailed his connection to the Islamic State group ideology during the COVID-19 pandemic closures, despite his parents’ disapproval of his newfound beliefs.
- Expressed Frustration and Motivation: In communications with an informant, Mercurio expressed a desire for martyrdom and a “bloodlust” for violence against those he deemed idolaters, indicating an urgent need for more potent weapons.
- Law Enforcement Intervention: The FBI arrested Mercurio following his audio pledge of allegiance to the Islamic State group, preventing the planned attacks and highlighting the ongoing efforts to counter domestic terrorism.
- Legal Proceedings: Facing up to 20 years in prison if convicted, Mercurio is currently detained, awaiting his initial court appearance without having entered a plea.
The Associated Press has the story:
Idaho teen faces fed. terrorism charge as he planned to attack a church for ISIS
Newslooks- BOISE, Idaho (AP) —
A teenager planned to attack churches in a northern Idaho city using a metal pipe, butane fuel, a machete and, if he could get them, his father’s guns, according to federal prosecutors who charged him with attempting to provide material support to the Islamic State group.
Authorities said Alexander Scott Mercurio, 18, adopted the Islamic faith against his Christian parents’ wishes and was in contact with FBI informants posing as Islamic State group supporters.
Mercurio was arrested Saturday, the day before investigators believe he planned to carry out the attack. Court documents did not reveal if he had an attorney and phone messages for a relative were not immediately returned Tuesday. Mercurio did not immediately respond to an email through a jail inmate email system.
Mercurio told one informant he intended to incapacitate his father with the pipe, handcuff him and steal his guns and a car to carry out the attack in Coeur d’Alene, according to an FBI agent’s sworn statement in the case unsealed Monday in U.S. District Court.
The guns included rifles, handguns and ammunition his father kept in a locked closet, but Mercurio still planned to attack with the pipe, fire and knives if he couldn’t get the firearms, alleged the sworn statement by FBI task force officer John Taylor II.
If he could get the key and access the closet, Mercurio said in an audio recording he gave the informant, “everything will be so much easier and better and I will achieve better things,” according to the statement.
The recording was to accompany a photo the informant took of Mercurio in front of the Islamic State flag holding up a knife and his index finger in a gesture commonly used by the group, the statement alleged.
After attacking the church, Mercurio told the informant he planned to attack others in town — as many as 21 — before being killed in an act of martyrdom, according to the statement.
Mercurio talked with confidential informants over a two-year span and at one point tried to build an explosive vest to wear during the attacks, the statement alleged.
Mercurio told a confidential informant that he first connected with the Islamic State group during the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, when schools were closed, Taylor said, and investigators later found several files on his school-issued laptop detailing Islamic State group ideology. Mercurio’s parents disapproved of his beliefs, he allegedly told a confidential informant posing as an Islamic State group supporter, and Mercurio eventually began to worry that he was a hypocrite for not yet carrying out an attack, according to the statement.
“I’ve stopped asking and praying for martyrdom because I don’t feel like I want to fight and die for the sake of Allah, I just want to die and have all my problems go away,” he wrote in a message to the informant, according to the statement.
On March 21, Mercurio sent a direct message to the informant again, saying he was restless, frustrated and wondered how long he could keep living “in such a humiliated and shameful state,” the statement alleged.
“I have motivation for nothing but fighting … like some time of insatiable bloodlust for the life juice of these idolators; a craving for mayhem and murder to terrorize those around me. I need some better weapons than knives,” the direct message said, according to the statement.
Law enforcement moved to arrest Mercurio after he sent an audio file pledging his allegiance to the Islamic State group, the statement alleged.
“Thanks to the investigative efforts of the FBI, the defendant was taken into custody before he could act, and he is now charged with attempting to support ISIS’s mission of terror and violence,” Attorney General Merrick Garland wrote in a press release. “The Justice Department will continue to relentlessly pursue, disrupt, and hold accountable those who would commit acts of terrorism against the people and interests of the United States.”
If convicted, Mercurio could be sentenced to up to 20 years in prison. Mercurio has not yet had an opportunity to enter a plea, and he is being held in a northern Idaho jail while he awaits his first court appearance.
