Najibullah Zazi planned to carry out an attack on the New York City subway on the anniversary of September 11, a federal prosecutor said today.
Zazi was “intent on being in New York on 9/11,” U.S. prosecutor Tim Neff told a federal court in Denver.
Zazi was charged yesterday in connection with a plot to make a chemical explosive called Triacetone Triperoxide (TATP), which prosecutors say he planned to use to blow up the New York City subway. That same explosive was used in the London Underground bombings of 2005. Prosecutors also allege he received terrorist training at an al Qaeda camp in Afghanistan last year.
Zazi had previously been charged with lying to federal investigators, but Neff has asked a judge to drop those charges so that Zazi can be transferred to New York to face the more serious charges.
“The defendant was in the throes of making a bomb and attempting to perfect his formulation,” Neff said, describing the evidence as “chilling, disturbing sequence of events.”
We laid out the alleged plot’s details, based on court documents, here.
Zazi, 24, was born in Afghanistan. He owns a coffee cart in New York City, and drives an airport shuttle in Denver.
