Jonas Edmonds, 30 years old, pleaded guilty to “conspiracy to provide material support to a designated foreign terrorist organization” and making a false statement to police in relation to worldwide terrorism, according to a spokesman for the Northern District of IL branch of the USA attorney’s office. “And then if he steps off, it’s gonna be the company commander”.
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His cousin Hasan Edmonds, 23, pleaded guilty to one count of “conspiring to provide material support to the Islamic State of Iraq”, and one count of attempting to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization.
According to court documents, an undercover Federal Bureau of Investigation agent sent Edmonds a friend request on Facebook in late 2014, and in January, Edmonds and the agent exchanged a series of messages on Facebook, and Hasan allegedly discussed plans to travel overseas with his cousin to fight with ISIS extremists, CBS Chicago reported.
Jonas Edmonds was sentenced to 21 years in prison earlier on Tuesday.
After dropping his cousin off at Chicago’s Midway International Airport on March 25, 2015, Jonas Edmonds went to his cousin’s home and collected National Guard uniforms that he planned to wear as a disguise during the armory attack.
“Had this scheme succeeded, we would have been left to mourn yet more victims of ideological terrorism”, he added.
The sentencing for the American-born cousins comes days after the weekend bombings in NY and New Jersey led to a massive manhunt and the arrest of Pakatani-born Ahmad Khan Rahami, as well as a stabbing spree at a Minnesota mall that has been linked to a wing of the Islamic State. He was sentenced to 21 years by U.S. District Judge John Z. Lee.
Tounisi and Khan have pleaded guilty and await sentencing.
“Because (Hasan Edmonds’) actions were a contemptible betrayal of both the nation’s trust and his fellow soldiers, he should be forced to pay a heavy price”, Jonas wrote. Prosecutors want a 30-year sentence for Hasan Edmonds and 21-year prison term for Jonas Edmonds.
The attack was allegedly planned to be carried out after Edmonds departed for Cairo.
“I harmed no one because I am not some crazed terrorist with a personal agenda of mayhem and destruction”, the letter states.
The feds kept close tabs on the cousins as they formed their terrorist plot.
Hasan Edmonds was a guardsman assigned to the Joliet armory with fellow members of the 634th Brigade Support Battalion; authorities say that gave him inside knowledge he shared with his cousin in planning an attack on the base. “But rather, I am a young man who was temporally [sic] led astray by the hateful rhetoric of a group who I [sic] reality could care less about the religion they claim to represent or the people they swear they wish to protect”.
In 2013, federal authorities charged Aurora resident Abdella Ahmad Tounisi with providing material support to terrorists after he allegedly pledged on a fake recruitment website – secretly operated by the FBI – to join terrorists in Syria.
“But for Jonas Edmonds’ fanaticism, Hasan most likely would have continued down the path of an honorable soldier and model citizen”, Flynn wrote.
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On Feb. 2, 2015, Hasan Edmonds contacted the undercover agent again and said his cousin was willing to carry out the attack on US soil.
