By Steve Neavling
ticklethewire.com
Federal law enforcement agents announced Monday they had foiled a domestic terror plot by an Army veteran to detonate bombs at multiple Southern California locations.
Former Army infantryman Mark Steven Domingo, 26, of Los Angeles, was arrested after he accepted what he thought was a live bomb from what turned out to be an undercover FBI agent. The device was a phony explosive.
Domingo, who served in Afghanistan, converted to Islam and said he was going to launch an attack as retribution for the white supremacist shootings at two mosques in New Zealand that killed 50 people, according to the Justice Department.
Federal authorities said he spoke of unleashing an attack aimed at killing hundreds of people, especially white nationalists, Jews, churches and military bases, The New York Times reports.
“Mr. Domingo said he specifically bought three-inch nails because they would be long enough to penetrate the human body and puncture internal organs,” Nicola Hanna, the U.S. attorney for the Central District of California, said at a news conference on Monday.
Domingo posted online that he supported “violent jihad, a desire to seek retribution for attacks against Muslims, and a willingness to become a martyr,” according to the Justice Department.
Domingo was charged Saturday with providing and attempting to provide material support to terrorists. He “planned and took steps to manufacture and use a weapon of mass destruction in order to commit mass murder,” according to the criminal complaint filed Monday.
