TERROR TRIAL LOOMS
Prosecutors: Protect IDs of FBI
Federal prosecutors are fighting to shield the identities of FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force members who were involved in the shooting of suspected terrorist Usaamah Rahim two years ago for fear their names will be used by the Islamic State to inspire attacks in America.
The request has been made of U.S. District Court Judge William G. Young in preparation for the upcoming trial of Rahim’s nephew David Daoud Wright — the city’s first terrorism trial since Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was convicted and sentenced to death in 2015.
Prosecutors are asking Young to bar Wright’s attorneys from asking witnesses the names of the police officers and federal agents who confronted and killed the knife-wielding Rahim in a Roslindale parking lot on June 2, 2015. Authorities said they believed Rahim, 26, planned to behead police on behalf of ISIS armed with the 13-inch fighting knife he was brandishing.
“In addition to being irrelevant, the public disclosure of the identities of Rahim’s shooters will likely be used by ISIS in their propaganda materials and calls to commit attacks in the United States,” Assistant U.S. Attorney B. Stephanie Siegmann wrote in her filing.
To illustrate her point, Siegmann said three months before Rahim died, “ISIS posted the names and addresses of 100 U.S. military service members on the internet and instructed their supporters to ‘kill them in their own lands, behead them in their own homes, stab them to death as they walk their streets thinking they are safe ...’ ”
Wright, formerly of Everett, is accused of conspiring to provide material support to ISIS, conspiring to commit acts of terrorism and obstruction of justice.
The FBI recorded Rahim days before his death telling Wright over the phone, “I just got myself a nice little tool. You know it’s good for carving wood and like, you know, carving sculptures ... and you know ...”
Rahim told Wright hours before he was killed that he was abandoning a plan to go to New York City and instead would “go after” the “boys in blue” in Boston, saying he welcomed the opportunity to “meet Allah” through “jihad,” according to both court papers and an investigation into his death last year by Suffolk District Attorney Daniel F. Conley’s office. Conley ruled Rahim’s shooting was justified in self-defense.
Wright’s trial is scheduled to begin Sept. 18.