Federal prosecutors have charged Emerson Begolly, the Nazi uniform wearing Pennsylvania man being held for allegedly biting an FBI agent who tried to question him about his activity on jihadist websites, with inciting violent attacks in the United States.
An indictment announced on Thursday by the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia charges that Begolly used an extremist web forum to solicited others to engage in acts of terrorism and disseminated instructions for making different kinds of explosives that could be used in terrorist attacks.
Begolly allegedly suggested attacks on “civilian planes, financial institutions, military installations, Jewish schools, and daycare centers,” according to the indictment.
While transcripts of some of Begolly’s alleged writings had been filed in federal court in Pennsylvania when prosecutors were convincing a judge not to release him on bail, the new indictment marked the first time he was charged directly with a terrorism-related charge.
According to the writings, Begolly blamed a pedophile minister on his hatred of America and joked that someone at the FBI must have been “drunk” when he was allowed to buy an AK-47.
The new indictment quotes a post allegedly written by Begolly in which he brags about how easy it was for him to get a weapon even though he was on the terrorist watch list.
“Dear brothers and sisters, I have solid PROOF that one can legally purchase a firearm in America even if this person IS on the ‘terror watch’ list, just so long as they are not a convicted felon and are a US citizen over 18!” he allegedly wrote on Nov. 24, 2010. “My advice: As long as you still can, take advantage of this and MOVE… MOVE… MOVE…!!”
Begolly was first arrested in a Burger King parking lot after he allegedly reached for a gun in his pocket and bit two FBI agents questioning him about his online habits.
His lawyers and members of his family have said he has Asperger’s syndrome, a disorder in the autism spectrum characterized by difficulties with social interaction. Begolly’s mother told FBI agents he had been off his medication for two years, according to an FBI agent’s testimony earlier this year.
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