(Reuters) – FBI agents have arrested a former member of the Michigan Army National Guard accused of planning to carry out a mass shooting this week on behalf of Islamic State at a U.S. military base near Detroit, federal prosecutors said on Wednesday.
Agents arrested Ammar Abdulmajid-Mohamed Said, 19, on Tuesday after he traveled to an area near the Army installation and launched a surveillance drone in support of the attack plan, the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Detroit said in a statement.
Said is charged with attempting to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization and distributing information related to a destructive device, according to the government’s 42-page criminal complaint.
If convicted, Said could face up to 20 years in prison on each count, federal prosecutors said.
According to the complaint, Said spent months planning the attack with two undercover officers posing as IS operatives. The target of the alleged plot was the Army’s Tank-Automotive & Armaments Command facility at the Detroit Arsenal in Warren, Michigan, about 20 miles north of Detroit.
In addition to flying his drone over the base to conduct “operational reconnaissance and surveillance,” Said supplied armor-piercing ammunition and magazines that he believed would be used in the attack, the complaint said.
Said, a resident of Melvindale, Michigan, another Detroit suburb, enlisted in the Michigan National Guard in September 2022 and was discharged in late 2024, months after he allegedly began telling undercover investigators he was “fed up with” the U.S., according to the complaint.
It said Said pledged loyalty to an IS leader and that he boasted about the grenade and firearms training he received while a National Guard soldier and his ability to take apart and reassemble an assault rifle with his eyes closed.
Sue J. Bai, head of the Justice Department’s national security division, said the investigation “foiled the attack” that Said was accused of plotting.
He was scheduled to appear in federal court on Wednesday. Court records did not indicate whether the defendant had obtained legal representation.
(Reporting by Steve Gorman in Los Angeles; Editing by Leslie Adler)
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