Dayton Terror Suspect Claims He Is ‘Perfect Recruit For ISIS’

DAYTON, OH — A Dayton man who claimed to be “the perfect recruit for ISIS” was indicted Thursday in federal court on charges that he attempted to provide material support to the terrorist organization, the Justice Department said. Laith Waleed Alebbini, 26, was arrested April 26 at the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport before he could board a flight that would eventually take him to Syria to join ISIS fighters, the FBI said.

A legal permanent resident of the United States, Alebbini came to the United States from Jordan in 2014 under a student visa, according to court documents. If convicted, he could spend 20 years in prison, a $250,000 fine, lifetime supervision and possible deportation. He was detained after his arrest and will remain in federal custody until his yet-to-be scheduled trial.

Alebbini moved to Dayton on March 1 after meeting a woman he claimed was his wife. They aren’t legally married, and she won’t face charges, according to media reports.

The FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force was already monitoring his activities after his January 2017, arrest for illegal entry at the Turkish Embassy in Washington, D.C. The charges were dismissed, but he revealed his plans to join ISIS to a confidential source on March 3, according to the complaint.

In a Jan. 23 interview with the FBI and U.S. Secret Service, he admitted to posting pro-ISIS videos on his Facebook page, which has since been disabled, the Dayton Daily News reported. Noting the lax security at the embassy, he told the investigators: “(If) I had a bomb on me, I swear to God, three embassies would have gone down,” according to court documents.

According to court documents, Alebbini made multiple plans to travel to Syria before he was detained last month. Believing he was living among apostates who kill Muslims, he said he would discard his permanent green card because it might be used against him on judgment day, according to the complaint.

Three other people were identified in the complaint by their initials, but Ben Glassman, U.S. attorney for Ohio’s District, declined to discuss their involvement, WOSU public radio reported. He also declined to talk about what authorities learned in a search of a Dayton residence.

“I'm going to refrain at this time from talking about any evidence that may have been recovered from that search as we are still in the process of conducting searches and the investigation is ongoing,” he said after Alebbini was detained.

Dayton residents who lived in the same apartment complex were unnerved when they learned a terror suspect had been living so near.

“This is just mind blowing that people live there and, you know, they’re actually doing stuff like this,” Tyelie Webb, a neighbor, told KBTV. “You think they’re just living here, and then you find out they’re terrorists. That’s crazy.”

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