Man Arrested for Plotting To Blow Up Times Square with Explosives
A New York man has been arrested for allegedly plotting to blow up Times Square with grenades, local reports said.
The suspect is 22-year-old Ashiqul Alam of Queens, according to The Wall Street Journal.
He allegedly discussed buying grenades and detonating them in Times Square, according to ABC News, which cited law enforcement sources.
Alam was arrested in a New York Joint Terrorism Task Force undercover operation when he went to buy grenades, according to CNN and New York Daily News.
The suspect was not believed to be part of a larger plot, and police said that he posed no immediate threat at the time of his arrest, ABC News said.
The “lone wolf,” as investigators describe him, was expected to appear in federal court on Friday.
The U.S. Attorney’s office is reportedly set to comment on the case Friday as well.
New York has seen multiple acts of terrorism in recent years.
In 2010, a bomb attempt was thwarted in Times Square when a T-shirt vendor saw smoke coming out of a car and told police.
Multiple bombs were detonated in New York and New Jersey in 2016, resulting in 31 people being injured.
One device detonated in a trash can in New Jersey and two more were found before they went off. A fourth bomb in a dumpster detonated later that day in Chelsea, and a fifth was found nearby before it went off.
More recently, Richard Rojas crashed his car into a group of people in Times Square in May 2017. He killed one and injured 22.
Rojas was in the Navy and had mental health issues. His crash was not called an act terrorism.
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