A 26-year-old security guard shot dead by police and the FBI in Boston planned to behead US police officers at random, US court papers said on Wednesday.
Usaamah Rahim allegedly purchased three military-style knives and a sharpener from Amazon.com before allegedly deciding to “go after” the “boys in blue” because they were “the easiest target.”
However, he was killed outside a pharmacy at 7:00am on Tuesday. Police said he refused to drop his weapon and lunged toward five retreating officers, who then shot him to save their lives.
An alleged associate, David Wright, 25, appeared in court on Wednesday charged with conspiring to obstruct a federal investigation.
He was allegedly fully informed of Rahim’s plans and ordered him to delete his phone and computer data, and to destroy his smartphone to prevent it falling into the hands of law enforcement.
Court papers said Rahim, who lived in Boston, had been “planning to engage in a violent attack in the United States” since Tuesday last week.
He allegedly ordered three knives from Amazon, which were delivered to his home, and discussed his plan with Wright and a third person on a beach in Rhode Island on Sunday last week.
Wright allegedly told the FBI the first plan was to behead an unnamed victim in another state, but Rahim telephoned him at 5:00am on the morning of his death to change his mind.
Instead he told Wright that he was going to randomly kill police officers in Massachusetts — either on Tuesday or Wednesday — the court papers said.
It was with one of the knives purchased from Amazon that Rahim lunged towards officers two hours later, court papers alleged.
Wright was arrested overnight and accused of conspiring with Rahim to destroy, mutilate, conceal and cover up his smartphone in order to obstruct an investigation, which is a federal offense.
Rahim had at first plotted to behead conservative blogger and activist Pamela Geller, law enforcement sources told CNN television. She was in the spotlight last month when a security officer stopped an attack at her group’s contest for Prophet Mohammed drawings in Garland, Texas.
If convicted, Rahim faces up to five years in prison and a fine of US$250,000.
Boston Police Commissioner William Evans said there had been intelligence for “weeks” that military and law enforcement lives were at threat.
Authorities put out “several notices” about the threat of attack on law enforcement and military bases, he added.
On Wednesday, a Muslim community leader shown a video of Rahim’s death, said there was no evidence to back up a claim from his family that he had been shot in the back as he waited for the bus.
“It was not at a bus stop. He was not shot in the back,” Imam Abdullah Faaruuq told reporters.
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