A lawyer for an Afghan-born US citizen charged with bombings last weekend in NY and New Jersey asked to see his client on Wednesday and suggested the man’s first court appearance could occur in his hospital bed.
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Federal prosecutors said Rahami injured 31 people in Manhattan’s Chelsea neighbourhood with a homemade bomb that detonated on Saturday night in a case that law enforcement authorities now regard as terrorism.
Rahami ordered citric acid, ball bearings and electronic igniters on eBay and had them delivered to a Perth Amboy, New Jersey, business where he worked until September 12, the court complaints said.
Law enforcement recovered a “rambling” journal on Rahami when he was captured that referenced Abu Muhammad al-Adnani, the ISIS spokesman killed in a USA airstrike, and Anwar al-Awlaki, the American al-Qaida cleric killed in a drone strike, authorities have said.
Police in New York City also said they had not yet been cleared to speak to Ahmad Khan Rahami, 28, who was arrested on Monday after a gunfight with police in Linden, New Jersey.
Federal prosecutors say Rahami bought components online and recorded a video of himself igniting a blast in a backyard.
The 27th Street bomb never exploded.
Mr Rahami has been charged in relation to the NY explosion and another device that exploded harmlessly hours earlier near a race in Seaside Park, New Jersey. The blasts came two years after the Federal Bureau of Investigation looked into him but came up with nothing tying him to terrorism.
Journal entries from the bloodied book showed his disdain for the U.S. government and included references to Anwar al-Awlaki, the American-born Muslim cleric who was killed in a 2011 drone strike, the Boston Marathon bombings, the 2009 Fort Hood shootings in Texas and Osama bin Laden.
A judge has granted temporary sole custody to the mother of Rahami’s child, who has described the terror suspect as a deadbeat father and said he was “standoffish” to American culture.
“But they checked, nearly two months, and they say, ‘He’s OK, he’s clear, he’s not terrorist.’ Now they say he’s a terrorist”, the father said outside the family’s fried-chicken restaurant in Elizabeth, New Jersey.
Rahami’s public defender had asked he be brought to court Wednesday to face federal charges, but authorities said that could not happen until he was removed from the hospital in New Jersey, where he is in custody on the shootout-related charges, and brought to NY. An Afghan immigrant wanted in the bombings was captured Monday after being wounded in a gun battle with police.
Lynch, speaking Wednesday at an International Bar Association conference, said she has full confidence in prosecutors’ ability to bring Rahami “to justice for his heinous actions”.
As previously reported by New Jersey 101.5, Rahami has a criminal record out of Elizabeth, where he was last known to live with his family above the chicken restaurant it owned. On a trip to Pakistan in 2014, Rahami emailed his local congressman seeking help because his pregnant wife had an expired passport.
The FBI is seeking two men pictured with a suitcase that allegedly contained a bomb which failed to explode in NY on Saturday.
Meanwhile, investigators are looking into Rahami’s overseas travel, including a visit to Pakistan a few years ago, and want to know whether he received any money or training from extremist organizations.
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Authorities also said Mr Rahami ordered citric acid, ball bearings and electronic igniters on eBay and had them delivered to a business where he worked in Perth Amboy, New Jersey, on 12 September.
