Role of Informants and Undercover Agents

• North Carolina Jihad cluster (Daniel Boyd, Zakaria Boyd, Dylan Boyd, Anes Subasic, Hysen Sharifi, Mohammad Omar Ali Hassan, Ziyad Yaghi) – an unidentified informant befriended Boyd and recorded numerous conversations over several years in which Boyd declared, “I love jihad. I love to stand there and fight for the sake of Allah.”[1] The informant also reportedly heard Boyd say that if he could not make jihad abroad, he would “make jihad right here in America.”[2]
• Portland Seven (Habis Abdulla Al Saoub, Patrice Lumumba Ford, Ahmed Ibrahim Bilal, Muhammad Ibrahim Bilal, Jeffrey Leon Battle, Maher Hawash, October Martinique Lewis – After some of the “Portland Seven” were reported to be firearms training in a gravel pit in Skamania, Washington, FBI confidential informant Khalid Mustafa (who became an informant after being charged with drug and other offences) befriended Jeffrey Leon Battle, and recorded conversations about the Portland Seven’s plans to travel to China, as well as anti-Semitic rants from Battle.[3]
• Fort Dix plot (Mohamad Ibrahim Shnewer, Dritan Duka, Eljvir Duka, Shain Duka, Serdar Tatar, Agron Abdullahu) – FBI informants as well as a cooperating witness infiltrated the Fort Dix “cell” after authorities received a tip about the group’s possible militant planning.[4]
• Liberty City Seven plot (Narseal Batiste, Patrick Abraham, Stanley Grant Phanor, Burson Augustin, Rotschild Augustine) – Two paid FBI cooperating witnesses infiltrated the plot posing as terrorist financiers and suppliers, and also administered “oaths of allegiance” to al-Qaeda to the plotters, in addition to providing meeting places and suggesting targets for possible attack.[5]
• Toledo Ohio plotters (Mohammad Zaki Amawi, Marwan Othman El-Hindi, Wassim Mazloum, Zubair Ahmed, Khaleel Ahmed) – Amawi, El-Hindi, and Mazloum all met with an undercover informant known as “The Trainer” who discussed jihad with the men and provided them with instruction in the manufacture of improvised explosive devices, and went shooting with them. El-Hindi introduced “the Trainer” to Zubair and Khaleel Ahmed, who were charged and convicted separately of conspiracy to provide material support to terrorists.[6]
• Houston Taliban Plot (Adnan Babar Mirza and Kobe Diallo Williams) – two informants were used to build the case against Mirza and Williams for allegedly plotting to train and eventually join the Taliban, in order to engage in jihad. One informant, James Coates, reportedly alerted the FBI to their plans when he thought things were getting “out of hand.” An undercover agent was later brought in to take the group camping, engage in paramilitary activity (including hiking and shooting practice), and record conversations of the group, especially Mirza, discussing the Taliban.[7]
• Newburgh Synagogue plot (James Cromitie, David Williams, Onta Williams, Laguerre Payen) – paid government informant Shahed Hussain was a key component of the government’s case, and helped stage the sting operation that led to the men’s arrest.[8]
• Tarek Mehanna and Ahmed Abousamra – Bilal McCloud, an alleged co-conspirator with Mehanna and Abousamra in their alleged plans to seek training for jihad abroad, worked with the FBI as a cooperating witness and recorded conversations between the three and others.[9]
• Antonio Martinez – an FBI confidential informant (CI)first noticed extremist postings on Martinez’s Facebook page, and contacted Martinez after receiving instructions from the FBI. CI also put Martinez in touch with an FBI undercover agent who offered to help build the fake bomb Martinez later tried to detonate.[10]
• Shahawar Matin Siraj and James Elshafay – FBI informant Osama Eldawoody befriended Siraj, and recorded conversations with Siraj that were later used against him at trial.[11]
• Michael Finton – an acquaintance working as an FBI informant recorded Finton making statements about traveling abroad to wage jihad.[12]
• Hemant Lakhani – A cooperating witness recorded conversations with Lakhani related to Lakhani’s attempt to sell weapons to people he thought were representatives of a terrorist organization.[13]
• Paul Hall (Hassan Abu-Jihaad) and Derrick Shareef – informant William Chrisman communicated and recorded conversations with Hall in relation to a possible plot to attack a shopping mall (Derrick Shareef was eventually charged in connection with the plot). Hall was convicted of passing U.S. Navy secrets to militants.[14]
• Mohammed Mosharref Hossain and Yassin Muhiddin Aref – these two were caught in a sting operation, a fictitious plot to assassinate the Pakistani envoy to the United Nations, a plot orchestrated in part by informant Shahed Hussain.[15]
• Abdulrahman Farhane – government informant Mohamed Alanssi (who later became disenchanted with the FBI and set himself on fire in front of the White House) recorded conversations with Farhane where Farhane discussed sending money abroad to jihadists in Afghanistan and Chechnya.[16]
• Rafiq Sabir and Tarik Shah – Tarik Shah met with an FBI “confidential source” and discussed his and Sabir’s desire to assist al-Qaeda by providing martial arts training and medical support.[17] Shah and subsequently Sabir eventually met with an undercover FBI agent pretending to represent al-Qaeda, to whom they pledged loyalty to the organization.
• Shaker Masri – an FBI informant and colleague of Masri’s recorded conversations where Masri discussed going abroad to become a suicide bomber and also made reference to a desire to attack American soldiers, and also made plans with Masri to go abroad.[18]
• Imran Mandhai and Shueyb Mossa Jokhan – after receiving a tip from a mosque-goer of Mandhai’s radical leanings, an FBI informant named “Mohammad” enlisted Mandhai and then Jokhan in a fake plot to stage attacks in Florida, which included casing a nuclear power plant and a National Guard armory.[19]
• Hamid Hayat – Hayat’s trial for providing material support to terrorists by seeking training in Pakistan relied in part on secretly-recorded conversations with a paid government informant, Naseem Khan, who was given $200,000 to report on Lodi, California’s large Muslim community.[20]
• Mahmud Faruq Brent (Mahmud al-Mutazzim) – Tarik Shah agreed to record conversations with Brent after Shah was arrested on charges of providing material support to terrorist groups. Shah recorded Brent discussing his training with Lashkar-e-Taiba.[21]
• Barry Bujol – after the FBI had determined that Bujol was in contact with Anwar al-Awlaki in 2008, an FBI informant posing as an AQAP operative made contact with Bujol. Bujol allegedly told the operative of his desire to fight for AQAP in Yemen, and Bujol took documents from the informant that he thought were intended for AQAP members overseas.[22]
• Russell Defreitas and Abdul Kadir – after intelligence allegedly linking Defreitas with terrorists in South America was uncovered, an FBI informant approached Defreitas and eventually worked with him on a plan to bomb fuel arteries at JFK Airport in New York. At the time of his arrest in 2007, Defreitas was living in an apartment paid for by the informant.[23]
• Ruben Shumpert – The FBI used paid informants to keep an eye on Shumpert’s Seattle barber shop, where they allege he showed customers jihadist videos. The informants were also used to buy handguns and counterfeit money from Shumpert.[24]
• Waad Ramadan Alwan and Mohanad Shareef Hammadi – After monitoring Alwan for about a year, the FBI in late 2010 arranged for a Confidential Human Source (CHS) to meet Alwan; the CHS allegedly recorded Alwan discussing previous insurgent activity, and helped arrange a sting operation whereby Alwan and later Hammadi helped move weapons and money the two allegedly believed were destined for al-Qaeda in Iraq.[25]
• Khalid Abdul-Latif and Walli Mujahidh – Abdul-Latif and Mujahidh allegedly attempted to recruit a Muslim man to join their plot, who then reported the attempt to the FBI and agreed to serve as an informant and confidential source.[26]
• Rezwan Ferdaus – an FBI “cooperating witness” met with Ferdaus starting in January 2011 and recorded conversations with him. [27]
• Jose Pimentel – Pimentel allegedly began making “incriminating statements” that were recorded by an NYPD informant at some point, and informed the informant of his progress in plotting an attack and constructing a homemade explosive. Pimentel was also allegedly videotaped building bomb components at the informant’s apartment.[28]

Note: Not included in our  total count of informant-driven cases were a group of around two dozen US citizens or residents (many from Minnesota) who have been arrested or indicted for funding or providing other support to the Somali terrorist group Al Shabaab (“the Youth”) since 2009. According to news reports, confidential informants followed “some of the ringleaders” for years, but as we do not know how many cases were affected by the involvement of the informant, they are not included in our count.[29]

Role of Government Under-Cover officers (UCs); total 21 (11%).

We found 21 cases where FBI or local police under cover officers played a role in the case; 11% of the total number of cases.

• Farooque Ahmed – in a period between April and October 2010, Ahmed allegedly met with undercover federal agents whom he thought were representatives of al-Qaeda. Ahmed allegedly took mission taskings from them, suggested targets for bombing, and scouted several Washington, DC-area metro stations on their instruction.[30]
• Mohamed Mahmoud Alessa and Carlos Almonte – an undercover agent with the NYPD Intelligence Division befriended Alessa and Almonte, secretly recording discussions where the three discussed plans to go to Somalia to fight with al-Shabaab.[31]
• Ryan Anderson – Anderson, a U.S. soldier with the 81^st Armored brigade, attempted to pass intelligence to a person he thought was a representative of al-Qaeda, but was instead an undercover FBI agent.[32]
• Shahawar Matin Siraj and James Elshafay – while the primary actor in this sting operation was an informant, Osama Eldawoody, an undercover detective had initial conversations with Siraj that included Siraj’s “approval of suicide bombings and Osama bin Laden,” conversations that played a role in weakening Siraj’s attempted entrapment defense at trial.[33]
• Michael Finton – Finton was ensnared by undercover government agents in his plot to detonate what turned out to be an inert explosive in front of a federal courthouse in Springfield, Illinois.[34]
• Raja Lahrasib Khan – an undercover government agent recorded conversations in which Khan allegedly spoke about providing covert monetary assistance to terrorist leader Ilyas Kashmiri, and also spoke about his past personal interactions with Kashmiri.[35]
• Antonio Martinez – an informant put Martinez in touch with an FBI undercover agent (UC) who constructed the inert bomb that Martinez then attempted to detonate in front of an army recruitment center in Maryland.[36]
• Houston Taliban plot (Adnan Babar Mirza and Kobie Diallo Williams) – an FBI undercover agent went camping with Mirza and several others, and recorded conversations in which Mirza “talked about ambushing U.S. soldiers and triggering a bomb with a cell phone,” and also discussed sending money to Taliban widows.[37]
• Mohamed Osman Mohamud – undercover FBI agents were integral to the sting operation that ended in Mohamud’s arrest, meeting with him, scouting targets, taking him into the Oregon woods to set off what he thought was a cell phone-triggered explosive, and constructing and providing Mohamud with the inert explosive that he attempted to detonate during Portland’s annual Christmas Tree lighting ceremony.[38]
• Rafiq Sabir and Tarik Shah – Sabir and Shah conspired with an undercover FBI agent, whom they believed to be a representative of al-Qaeda, to provide medical care and martial arts training to al-Qaeda.[39]
• Derrick Shareef – as part of Shareef’s alleged plot to attack an Illinois shopping mall, he traded a pair of audio speakers in exchange for inert weapons and a hand grenade, provided by an FBI undercover agent.[40]
• Hosam Smadi – FBI undercover agents contacted Smadi after noticing extremist postings online, and posed as an al-Qaeda sleeper cell. They provided Smadi with an inert bomb that Smadi then attempted to detonate.
• Ahmed Ferhani and Mohamed Mamdouh – Ferhani and Mamdouh were secretly recorded by an NYPD undercover officer allegedly discussing their hatred of Jews and plotting to dress as Hasidic Jews in order to infiltrate and attack a New York synagogue. They were arrested after Ferhani purchased three handguns and a grenade from an undercover officer.[41]
• Khalid Abdul-Latif and Walli Mujahidh – undercover government agents sold the pair inoperable machine guns before their arrest.[42]
• Rezwan Ferdaus – Ferdaus allegedly worked with several undercover FBI agents who told Ferdaus they were part of al-Qaeda; agents gave Ferdaus money and received equipment that Ferdaus allegedly constructed to serve as remote control detonators for Improvised Explosive Devices.[43]

Note: we found seven cases where both informants and under cover officers played a role in a particular individual case.