A Connecticut man attempted to travel overseas to join the Islamic State, say authorities who received tips about him from Islamic Centers in two different states.
Kevin Imam McCormick, 26, was charged in late October with providing material support to a foreign terrorist organization after allegedly pledging his allegiance to ISIS and its leader in a video, the Daily Beast reports. The arrest follows a months-long FBI investigation.
“I do like ISIS because Abu Musa was like my hero, I cry when I watch that video,” he said in an exchange with an FBI informant, according to court documents unsealed this week.
The U.S. Attorney’s office in Connecticut stated that McCormick is detained but declined to provide additional information. Defense attorneys have not answered repeated requests for comment.
According to the affidavit, the FBI was alerted to McCormick, a former truck driver, on Aug. 24, when members from an Islamic center in another state reported that McCormick had stated “we should support ISIS” and “Jihad is the way to go.” The community members also told authorities McCormick had asked about “circumcision and wanted a doctor that could help him with the procedure.”
About a week later, another individual “who attends an Islamic Center in another state” told authorities McCormick “expressed a desire to travel to Syria to ‘fight for Allah,’” the affidavit states. The 26-year-old attempted to justify his extremist ideologies, the individual told authorities, by quoting and citing various religious doctrines, although “he did so incorrectly.”
Authorities also state that after McCormick was fired as a truck driver in September, he attempted to purchase a firearm and a knife—but was declined after he admitted to a sales clerk the weapons were “not for an animal.”
