SAN DIEGO –
A Canadian nationwide who lived in Southern California was sentenced to 20 years in U.S. jail on Monday for serving to no less than a half-dozen Canadians and Americans be part of the Islamic State group in Syria in 2013 and 2014 — together with the primary recognized American to die preventing for the militant group.
Abdullahi Ahmed Abdullahi immediately funded “violent acts of terrorism,” together with the kidnapping and killing of individuals in Syria, stated U.S. Attorney Randy Grossman in a press release.
Abdullahi acknowledged in a plea settlement that he helped a resident of San Diego, Douglas McAuthur McCain, be part of IS. McCain was killed in Syria whereas preventing alongside IS fighters towards Syrian opposition forces in 2014.
Prosecutors additionally stated Abdullahi offered cash to ship an 18-year-old cousin from Minneapolis, Minnesota, to affix IS fighters in Syria, in addition to three different cousins from Edmonton, Canada.
The males all died in fight, based on the U.S. authorities.
Abdullahi was detained by Canadian authorities in 2017 and extradited to the U.S. two years later. He pleaded responsible to offering materials assist to terrorists in 2021.
He additionally admitted to robbing an Edmonton jewellery retailer in (*20*) 2014 to lift cash to fund the overseas fighters. Weeks after committing that theft, Abdullahi despatched cash to McCain so he may go to Syria.
McCain’s brother, Marchello McCain, was sentenced in 2018 to 10 years in U.S. federal jail for making false statements throughout a number of interviews with federal brokers from 2014 to 2015, together with denying realizing that his brother deliberate to battle for IS. He instructed the FBI that he thought his brother was going to Turkey to play music and train English.
The U.S. introduced earlier this month it killed three IS leaders in two separate operations, together with a uncommon floor raid in part of northeast Syria underneath authorities management.
Despite their defeat in Syria in 2019, when IS misplaced the final sliver of land its fighters as soon as managed, the extremists’ sleeper cells have continued to hold out lethal assaults in Syria and Iraq. IS fighters as soon as held massive elements of the 2 nations.