A Kenyan man was convicted Monday of conspiring to hijack a plane in the U.S. and crash it into a building in an attack eerily reminiscent of the Sept. 11, 2001, attack.
Cholo Abdi Abdullah was found guilty by a jury of all six charges he faced in connection with the plot, which he planned to carry out on behalf of the designated terrorist group al-Shabab, an affiliate of al Qaeda that aims to to create an Islamic state in Somalia that adheres to Sharia law.
He was arrested in the Philippines in 2019 after completing two years of flight training and obtaining a pilot’s license. He also investigated “the means and methods of hijacking a commercial airliner,” how to break open a cockpit door, and sought “information about the tallest building in a major American city,” the Justice Department said in a 19-page indictment published in 2011. December 2020 after Abdullah was extradited to the US
“This chilling callback to the horrific attacks of September 11, 2001 is a stark reminder that terrorist groups like Al Shabab remain committed to killing American citizens and attacking the United States,” the department said in a statement at the time.
Federal officials alleged he spent four years plotting the attack, from training in explosives to learning how to operate in secret and avoid detection.
Abdullah is scheduled to be sentenced in March, with an expected prison sentence of at least 20 years.
During his trial, Abdullah, representing himself, did not give an opening statement or question witnesses as a way of refraining from participating in a system he did not believe in.
With News Wire services
