Yesterday morning, a number of homes in Flushing, Queens were raided as part of an ongoing terror investigation. Senator Chuck Schumer said, "There was nothing imminent," and described the raids as "preventive," but now the Daily News says the FBI was worried the suspects may be involved in a Denver-based terror cell. A source said, "The FBI is seriously spooked about these guys planning another 9/11. This is not some ... FBI informant-driven case. This is the real thing."
According to the Post, the main suspect is "a Queens-born man in his late 20s who has an Afghani father" who lives in Denver, "But the investigation quickly turned to New York as intelligence indicated he was heading here to obtain bomb-making materials." After driving to New York in a rental car, "The man had been in New York for about a week when the raids were unleashed -- and he suddenly hot-footed it back to Denver by plane out of La Guardia, sources said."
A friend of the suspect said that he had operated a coffee cart in NYC before moving to Denver—and that he had returned to deal with a permit issue. The friend told the Times, "I couldn’t imagine some of the kinds of questions [the authorities] asked... I told them everything I know," adding, "This is our country. We’re going to be citizens soon. We work here, we live here, we love this country as much as you." Another man in one of the raided homes said everyone worked too hard to be involved with terrorism. No materials were found in any of the homes.
Now the FBI and Department of Homeland Security have issued an alert to law enforcement agencies about bomb-making materials.
