The Uzbek immigrant behind New York’s worst attack in 16
years confessed to acting in the name of the Islamic State group and “felt
good” about the killings, having planned an assault for a year, investigators
said Wednesday.
The shocking details emerged as federal prosecutors filed
terrorism charges against Sayfullo Saipov, who subsequently appeared in court
in a wheelchair — he had been shot in the abdomen by police — 24 hours after
mowing down pedestrians and cyclists, and colliding with a school bus.
US President Donald Trump vowed an immediate crackdown on
the visa program that he said allowed the 29-year-old to immigrate in 2010,
saying he would “certainly consider” sending the suspect to the military
detention center in Guantanamo Bay and later calling for his execution.
The attack killed eight people, five of them childhood
friends from Argentina celebrating 30 years since their high school graduation,
a 31-year-old Belgian mother, and two US men, from New York and neighboring New
Jersey.
Of 12 wounded, four remained in critical condition following
the deadliest attack in America’s financial capital since the Al-Qaeda
hijackings on September 11, 2001.
Saipov first started planning an attack a year ago, before
settling two months ago on using a truck to kill as many people as possible
during Halloween celebrations, according to a federal terrorism complaint.
Prosecutors unveiled the charges, saying he had waived his
rights and confessed to being inspired by IS propaganda, after yelling “Allahu
akbar” (“God is greatest” in Arabic) upon exiting a rented pickup truck in
Lower Manhattan on Tuesday.
“Saipov committed this attack in support of ISIS,” US acting
Manhattan attorney Joon Kim announced, using an acronym to refer to the IS
jihadist group.
Saipov appeared in a wheelchair before a US magistrate in
Manhattan federal court, where the charges were formally read.
He was not required to enter a plea and was later sent to a
federal detention facility, most likely in New York, a spokesman for the US
Attorney’s office told AFP.
‘Hang him’
He was found in possession of multiple knives in a black
bag, a Florida driving license and two cell phones that contained thousands of
IS propaganda images and dozens of IS propaganda videos, Kim said.
The files depicted “among other things, ISIS fighters
killing prisoners by running over them with a tank, beheading them, and
shooting them in the face,” Kim added.
“Saipov requested to display ISIS’s flag in his hospital
room and stated that he felt good about what he had done,” the charging
document revealed.
The complaint listed two counts: provision of material
support and resources to a designated foreign terrorist organization, and
violence and destruction of motor vehicles. It was not immediately clear if he
would face further charges.
Kim said the material support charge carries a maximum
sentence of life imprisonment. Federal prosecutors could also potentially seek
the death penalty.
In the largely-Muslim neighborhood where Saipov lived with
his wife and children for little over a year in the New Jersey town of
Paterson, residents seethed with anger Wednesday, furious he had besmirched
their hard-working immigrant reputation.
“They should hang him!” snapped the manager of a launderette
near his modest apartment. “If you come to the US, it’s to do something better,
not something bad!” she spat, refusing to give her name out of fear.
A police officer shot Saipov after he exited the truck
brandishing paintball and pellet guns.
Vehicle rammings have been a frequent tactic deployed by IS
sympathizers in the West, including in Barcelona, London, Stockholm and in
Nice, where a Tunisian suicide truck bomber killed 86 people on Bastille Day
last year.
“He appears to have followed almost exactly to a ‘T’ the
instructions that ISIS has put out in its social media channels before with
instructions to their followers on how to carry out such an attack,” senior
police officer John Miller said.
New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said Saipov had been
radicalized after moving to the United States. He is not a US citizen but a
legal permanent resident.
Trump urges death penalty
Trump said he was “starting the process of terminating” the
popular green card lottery, which he said had enabled Saipov to enter the
country.
“We have to do what’s right to protect our citizens,” the
Republican president told reporters. “We will get rid of this lottery program
as soon as possible.”
He also called for “punishment that’s far quicker and far
greater than the punishment these animals are getting right now.”
But the White House was forced to walk back some of his
comments, stressing that he was not taking executive action but looking to
Congress to change decades-old laws.
The president stuck to his hardline rhetoric on Twitter,
saying the attacker “SHOULD GET DEATH PENALTY!”
Trump has already slashed the country’s annual refugee
intake by more than 50 percent, tightened visa issuance around the world and
attempted to ban travelers from 11 countries, most of them with Muslim-majority
populations, but not Uzbekistan.
Saipov lived in Florida before moving to Paterson, a former
industrial hub about 20 miles (30 kilometers) northeast of New York.
Though it remains unclear whether Saipov acted alone, Cuomo
has drastically stepped up security at airports, tunnels and Penn Station,
which he called the busiest rail hub in the hemisphere.
Authorities announced they had found a second Uzbek they’d
been seeking in their investigation — 32-year-old Mukhammadzoir Kadirov — but
they provided no additional details.
In Manhattan, leaders vowed the annual marathon would go
ahead as planned on Sunday. Police said the event, which attracts more than
50,000 runners and 2.5 million spectators, would be the most protected ever.
Uzbekistan, a majority Muslim country that borders
Afghanistan and formerly part of the Soviet Union, is a landlocked country
racked with poverty, corruption and a stifling authoritarian regime.
Saipov is the fourth Uzbek-linked man in less than a year
blamed for deadly strikes overseas, following attacks in Istanbul, St
Petersburg and Stockholm.
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