A Muslim convert who talked about his desire to wage "acts of violent jihad" was charged in a plot to set off hand grenades at a shopping mall at the height of the Christmas rush, authorities said.
Investigators said Derrick Shareef, 22, a US citizen, was acting alone and never actually obtained any grenades. He was arrested on Wednesday when he met with an undercover agent in a parking lot to trade a set of stereo speakers for four hand grenades and a pistol, officers said on Friday.
"He fixed on a day of December 22nd on Friday ... because it was the Friday before Christmas and thought that would be the highest concentration of shoppers that he could kill and injure," said Robert Grant, the special agent in charge of the Chicago FBI office.
Authorities said Shareef had been under investigation since September, when he told an acquaintance that "he wanted to commit acts of violent jihad against targets in the United States as well as commit other crimes."
The acquaintance immediately informed the FBI, officials said.
Federal officials said Shareef planned to set off four hand grenades in garbage cans at the CherryVale shopping mall in Rockford, about 145km northwest of Chicago, where Shareef lived.
Other potential targets that Shareef allegedly discussed included government facilities such as courthouses and city hall, authorities said.
An affidavit quoted him as threatening to kill a judge: "I just want to smoke a judge."
"While these are very serious charges, at no time was the public in any imminent peril," US Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald said in a statement.
Shareef was born in the US and converted to Islam, officials said. They believe he might have learned about jihad through videos and Web sites.
Shpendim Nadzaku, imam of the Muslim Association of Greater Rockford, commended authorities for intercepting the alleged plot and reiterated "the Muslim community's condemnation of terrorism in the name of Islam."
Authorities described the plan as unsophisticated. Grant said Shareef "did not present any serious threat to anyone" because agents had him under close surveillance for weeks.
Asked if he had ever met Shareef, Nadzaku said, "No one in the community has any clue as to who this person is -- he's completely anonymous."
The door of a Rockford town home that is the last known address for Shareef went unanswered on Friday although a female inside was seen turning off a light as a reporter stood outside.
Shareef appeared briefly before a judge on Friday and was ordered held without bond. He was charged with one count of attempting to damage or destroy a building by fire or explosion and one count of attempting to use a weapon of mass destruction.
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