Fort Dix Plot Jurors Shown Violent Videos

(CBS/AP)  Prosecutors in the case of five men accused of planning an attack on a New Jersey Army base showed jurors videos they hoped would demonstrate the defendants were inspired by, and hoped to mimic, al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden.

One video - clearly homemade - shows men haphazardly firing guns on an overcast winter day in Pennsylvania's Pocono Mountains.

Others - slickly produced and in Arabic - depicted American troops in the deserts of Iraq falling to snipers' bullets and Humvees exploding.

Prosecutors do not claim that the defendants - all foreign-born Muslims in their 20s who lived in suburban New Jersey - were connected with any overseas terrorist groups. But they argue that had the defendants not been arrested in May 2007, they would have tried to carry out an attack on Fort Dix, where U.S. troops train for deployments to Iraq.

Lawyers for Serdar Tatar, Mohamad Ibrahim Shnewer and brothers Dritan, Eljvir and Shain Duka say that if such a plot existed, it was only because a paid government informant tried to lead them into it.

The men are charged with conspiring to murder military personnel, attempted murder and weapons offenses. They could face life in prison if convicted.

Testimony on Wednesday focused heavily on screenings of videos and testimony about items found in the suspects' homes. Federal agents described finding a map of Fort Dix in Mohamad Shnewer's bedroom, ammunition in all the suspects' homes, and smoke bombs in Dritan Duka's apartment.

Jurors saw almost 17 minutes of homemade footage labeled "Shooting and Horseback Riding."

Taken from a stationary camera and set to a soundtrack of Arabic chanting, it showed 10 men, including some of the suspects, taking turns firing four guns at a range in the Poconos in February 2007.

An FBI agent testified the video was found in the apartment of Dritan Duka after he was arrested. Other videos found at a home where Eljvir and Shain Duka lived showed U.S. military vehicles being bombed in Iraq or U.S. soldiers falling to sniper's bullets.

Most of the jurors in the case watched stoically, but some winced and put their hands over their mouths.

One video showed men in the desert, under cover of night, shooting machine guns at unknown targets. As they fired, the men shouted, "Allah akbar," Arabic for "God is great."

The Fort Dix suspects used the same phrase when they fired weapons in their video. And like the homemade video, several of the jihadist movies featured Islamic music.

[DDouville]

People shooting weapons and shouting Alah Akbar,that have videos showing Americans being shot by snipers have no business living in New Jersey, USA. Especially when every militant and terrorist on earth of Muslim denomination shouts Alah Akbar when attacking and killing US troops in combat. The similarities are too close here. Kick em out, and don''t let em back in. Ever. The past open border USA is finished. We have to protect ourselves from outsiders inspired by extremist religious beliefs that want to do us harm. This becomes more important with technology allowing individuals to do great destructive harm. I give credit to all the muslim fighters against us, they are very brave, but their ideoligy is flawed to the core, the way they interpret the Koran is completely wrong. God would not profess to kill innocent civilians to become a martyr. And targeting innocent civilians is what they excell at. Amen.

[el_cid2008]

(1) Appologies for the multiple copies of my comment. Sometimes my computer gets a mind of it''s own. (2) Isn''t it 72 virgins, not 69? (3) It requires death in combat to qualify for the virgins? [Meaning, suicide bombing don''t count?] If so, why not challenge all those "hundreds of terrorist sleeper cells" some believe to be in the USA to open combat with U.S. military and security forces? Save everyone else a lot of trouble and expense. Hold the challenge in a football stadium on live TV, call it the "Terrorist Bowl." Of course, it will be the "Terrorist Bust" if there aren''t such sleeper cells.

[el_cid2008]

(1) According to a news tidbit of a while back, one of the suspects delivered pizzas to the base, hence the map. (2) If the young men *really* wanted to kill U.S. soldiers, they could have simply poisoned the pizzas delivered. With something slow to produce symptoms, they could have delivered several loads of poisoned pizzas before an alarm was raised. (3) As plots go, this one barely qualifies as 3rd rate.

[el_cid2008]

(1) According to a news tidbit a while back, one of the suspects delivered pizzas to the base. Or this father did. Whatever. Hence the map of the base.
(2) If the suspects really wanted to kill U.S. soldiers, they could have simply poisoned the pizzas delivered. Something slow to produce symptoms would have enabled them to deliver several loads of poisoned pizzas before an alarm was raised.

[el_cid2008]

(1) According to a news tidbit a while back, one of the suspects delivered pizzas to the base. Or this father did. Whatever. Hence the map of the base.
(2) If the suspects really wanted to kill U.S. soldiers, they could have simply poisoned the pizzas delivered. Something slow to produce symptoms would have enabled them to deliver several loads of poisoned pizzas before an alarm was raised.

[averjane]

cont''d
You can''t trust everyone you see. You should be thankful we have a government watching over us to protect us. They ought to be thankful we aren''t brutal like them or they''d be dead by now with no trial at all. What''s the worst that can happen to them in America? They will be sent to live in the Guantamino Resort.

[averjane]

It is very naive to think that this could not be real. It''s just one of hundreds of sleeper cells already in our country who got caught that''s all. They were in the videos and shouting praises to their god while shooting guns so they are implicated. Criminals always do stupid things like that. clgl_fubar, if you had all this junk while living in Iraq and possessed videos of yourself and others chanting to God, what do you think they''d do to you? What a dummy. Do any of you appeasers have any common sense at all? Nancy Naove, I wish we could just all get along too, but the reality is, that''s not going to happen. Wake up. I hate having to go around mistrusting eastern born people but I don''t know when I''m looking at a terrorist or when I''m looking at an innocent person because I know these people are in our country and they know people like you are going to turn a blind eye. If as many of us were infiltrating their country and got caught doing these things, we''d be publicly executed with no remorse from them. So stop your whining and see what''s really going on. It''s not our fault that we feel this way about these people. They are sometimes up to no good and we know that.

[MM_Midnite]

The gorenment in New Jersey is not that good to make this up or frame anyone. If this was found it means that it is was more serious than what has been told. Either way.. if men or women of any race .. be it hispanic.. black.. white or arabic. Would take part in such actions as these five did. They should be taken serious. As for the map of Fort Dix. There are some arabic soldiers in the USA serving our country here as americans who still have dealings with people back in their home land.I can imagine it to be possible to get a map by becoming friends with someone at Fort Dix. That should also be looked into.

[prelgovisk]

"if it''''s cool for African American males to dress up like gangsters and film themselves in it and talk about violence against police, and look like bank robbers, drug dealers about to commit a crime, why is it not OK for Arabs to do the same? "

Umm..., maybe that is why one fourth of urban black men have spent time in jail. That is not called "getting away with it."

[brianbwb-2009]

"Federal agents described finding a map of Fort Dix in Mohamad Shnewer''s bedroom,"

Odd, it isn''t easy to find a map of a US military installation, that would have to come from an "insider".