CHICAGO (AP) – Two suburban Chicago men who posed for photos holding a black Islamic State group flag at a Lake Michigan beach park were arrested Wednesday on federal terrorist charges, and an undercover operative said one of the men suggested homosexuals should be thrown off the city’s tallest building.
An FBI sting begun in 2015 compiled evidence that Joseph D. Jones and Edward Schimenti sought to provide material support to Islamic State, including by provided cellphones to one person working for the FBI and posing as an IS supporter believing the phones would be used to detonate car bombs in Syria, the 65-page complaint says.
Jones, a part time chef, and Schimenti, who worked at a cancer treatment center, drove the FBI operative to Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport last week on what they thought would be the first leg of a journey to Syria. The complaint says Schimenti told him to “drench that land … with blood.”
The 35-year-old men looked tired standing in street clothes with their hands folded behind their backs during a brief initial hearing Wednesday in federal court in Chicago. When Magistrate Judge David Weisman asked if they understood the charges, both answered calmly that they did.
If convicted, the two would face a maximum prison term of 20 years. A detention hearing was set for Monday, after which they would enter pleas.