Alleged ISIS Conspiracy Sends 2nd Suburban Man To Federal Prison

CHICAGO — A Lake County man was sentenced Friday to more than 13 years in federal prison after a jury found him guilty of conspiring to aid the foreign terrorist group Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham, or ISIS, and lying about it to the FBI.

Zion residents and childhood friends Ed Schimenti, 39, and Joseph Jones, 28, were convicted in June 2019 following a three-week trial. The two men provided an undercover federal agent who they believed to be affiliated with ISIS with cell phones, which they believed would be used to detonate explosives, according to evidence presented at trial.

The two men were arrested in April 2017 after driving the confidential informant to O'Hare International Airport with the understanding that he would be flying to Syria and fighting on behalf of ISIS.

“You can Google my name and I put it in English so the Kuffar [unbelievers] can see, Islamic State here to stay!” Schimenti said, according to prosecutors.

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Schimenti and Jones attracted attention from federal law enforcement starting in 2015 in a series of public internet posts regarding their support for ISIS.

"To state the obvious, the defendants’ online statements were troubling and prompted the FBI to open an investigation in order to determine if the defendants were planning on providing support to ISIS either by traveling to join ISIS or through some other way," Assistant U.S. Attorney Barry Jonas said in the government's sentencing memo. "In order to ascertain their true intentions, the FBI created a ruse scenario to introduce an undercover employee to Jones"

Jonas noted the "egregious and dangerous" nature of the two men's conduct.

"However, the government also recognizes that at the time of the government’s engagement with them, as much as they desired to support ISIS, they were not actively plotting to either travel to join ISIS, looking to facilitate travel for others, or to commit a terrorist attack in the United States," the prosecutor said. "On the spectrum of comparable terrorism cases, the government does not believe a statutory maximum sentence is warranted."

Prosecutors recommended a 17 year sentence for Jones and a 20 year sentence for Schimenti, with both men to remain on supervised release for the rest of their lives.

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Schimenti's attorneys, Joshua Adams and Stephen Hall, argued for a five-year prison sentence followed by three years of supervised release.

"Plainly put, Ed never posed any serious or realistic threat to commit harm to anyone. This statement made to [his former girlfriend and roommate] should be viewed in the same vain as Ed’s statement that he wanted to 'see the ISIS flag atop the White House.' It is extremist and merely offhand rhetoric," they said this month in a sentencing memo. "While the statements themselves are disturbing they are in no way indicative of Ed’s intent to blow up the Naval Station. Indeed, the government never took this statement as a credible threat either."

At Friday's sentencing hearing, Schimenti told U.S. District Judge Andrea Wood that he was not a terrorist but rather a "big softie, a big teddy bear," according to WLS. Schimenti reportedly said he had some "off-color ideas" and that the violent fantasies described in undercover recordings provided by prosecutors — killing graduates at Naval Station Great Lakes in North Chicago or throwing gay people from Willis Tower — were just for "shock value."

In February, Wood rejected a request for a new trial or acquittal, ruling that a reasonable jury could have agreed that Schimenti and Jones were predisposed to provide material support for terrorism and not induced by federal agents.

Last month, Wood sentenced Jones last month to 12 years in federal prison. Both men's sentence will be followed by five years of supervised release.