Two women from Queens, NY pled guilty last Friday to wanting to build a bomb to use in a terrorist attack against the United States.
Asia Siddiqui, 35, and Noelle Velentzas, 31, are American citizens who visited a Home Depot store in Queens to look for materials to make explosives. At the store, the pair met an undercover agent called ‘Mel.”
“Noelle, Mel and I discussed the need to prepare for jihad,” Siddiqui told Brooklyn federal Judge Sterling Johnson Jr.
The pair now face up to 20 years in prison when they are sentenced.
Besides learning chemistry and electrical skills, they also researched how to make plastic explosives and build a car bomb.
Assistant Attorney General John C. Demers said, “Inspired by radical Islam, Balentzas and Siddiqui researched and taught each other how to construct bombs to be used on American soil against law enforcement and military targets.”
During the investigation, law enforcement officials seized propane gas tanks, jihadist literature, machetes and several knives from their residences.
Velentzas had a picture of Osama bin Laden holding an AK-47 as the background image on her cellphone and believed being a martyr would guarantee her entrance into heaven. She also wrote in a radical jihadist magazine that she believed “you go for the head” when you commit a terrorist attack.
