One accused gunman in shooting at Muhammad cartoon event was known to FBI
WASHINGTON — Since at least 2007, the FBI has been able to recognize the voice of Elton Simpson — one of the men suspected in the Texas shootings outside a contest featuring cartoons of the Muslim Prophet Muhammad. Agents recorded the young man from Phoenix talking about fighting non-believers for Allah. About plans to travel to South Africa and link up with “brothers” in Somalia. Simpson was arrested in 2010, one day before authorities say he planned to leave for South Africa. But despite more than 1,500 hours of recorded conversations, the government prosecuted him on only one minor charge — lying to a federal agent. Years spent investigating Simpson for terrorism ties resulted in three years of probation and $600 in fines. Then, on Sunday, two men whom authorities identified as Simpson and Nadir Soofi opened fire in a Dallas suburb on a security officer stationed outside the contest. The officials spoke only on condition of anonymity. The deliberately provocative contest had been expected to draw outrage from the Muslim community. According to mainstream Islamic tradition, any physical depiction of the Prophet Muhammad — even a respectful one — is considered blasphemous. Drawings similar to those at the Texas event have sparked violence around the world. Simpson and Soofi were wearing body armour, and one shot the guard in the leg. A police officer returned fire and struck both men, killing them. The guard was treated for his injury at a hospital and released. Simpson, described as quiet and devout, had been on the radar of law enforcement because of his social media presence, but authorities did not have an indication he was plotting an attack. Less was known about Soofi who appeared to have never been prosecuted in federal court. Simpson had worshipped at the Islamic Community Center of Phoenix for about a decade, but he quit showing up over the past two or three months, the president of the mosque said. A convert to Islam, Simpson first attracted the FBI’s attention in 2006 because of his ties to Hassan Abu Jihaad, a former U.S. navy sailor who had been arrested in Phoenix and was ultimately convicted of terrorism-related charges, according to court records. Jihaad was accused of leaking details about his ship’s movements to operators of a website in London that openly espoused violent jihad against the U.S. In the fall of that year, the FBI asked one of its informants, Dabla Deng, a Sudanese immigrant, to befriend Simpson and ask for advice about Islam. Deng had been working as an FBI informant since 2005 and was instructed to tell Simpson he was a recent convert to the religion. Over the next few years, Deng would tape his conversations with Simpson with a hidden recording device accumulating more than 1,500 hours of conversations. “I’m telling you, man, we can make it to the battlefield,” Simpson is recorded saying on May 29, 2009. “It’s time to roll.” On Monday, federal agents spent hours at a Phoenix apartment complex where the men apparently lived. “I’ve never seen him angry,” Usama Shami, president of the Islamic Community Center of Phoenix, said of Simpson. “That’s the honest truth. He was always having a grin.”