A North Carolina teenager charged with trying to help the Islamic State has now been indicted in the murder of his elderly neighbor.
Justin Nojan Sullivan, 19, was arrested in June of 2015 for allegedly plotting to get weapons and carry out assassinations and mass shootings on U.S. soil in the name of ISIS. Once authorities began searching Sullivan’s home and more thoroughly investigating him, they linked him to the unsolved murder of his neighbor, John Bailey Clark, 74.
The Burke County grand jury indicted Sullivan Wednesday in the murder, and the local district attorney’s office is handling Clark’s death. Authorities found the man buried in his own backyard in December of 2014 with multiple gunshot wounds to the head.
Federal authorities are investigating Sullivan’s alleged terrorist plots, which included killing hundreds. He discussed using a car bomb, chemical bomb, coating bullets in cyanide and robbing banks, according to a criminal complaint. He also allegedly planned to buy an AR-15 for his plot.
Sullivan was arrested a day before he bought the weapon and feds found a silencer that he had gotten for the attack in the home where he lived with his parents.
It was Sullivan’s father’s tip that sparked the entire investigation. The father called 911 in April after he saw his son destroying Buddha figurines and had poured gasoline on religious items, NBC News reports. He told the operator, “We are scared to leave the house.”
“Justin Sullivan had elaborate plans to kill hundreds of innocent people to show his support for the terrorist organization, ISIL,” Special Agent in Charge John A. Strong said in a statement.
After receiving the tip, an undercover Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agent reached out to Sullivan in June of 2015. Sullivan allegedly described himself as “a mujahid,” and offered to help the FBI agent join the “Islamic State in North America,” and even asked the agent to murder his father and stepmother.
Sullivan allegedly told the FBI operative “the war is here,” and said he would do a “minor assassination” as a training exercise to prepare for the major attack.
At one point, Sullivan allegedly told the FBI agent, “I liked IS from the beginning, then I started thinking about death and stuff so I became a Muslim.”
According to the Department of Justice, Sullivan’s litany of charges include “attempting to provide material support to ISIL; receipt of a silencer in interstate commerce with intent to commit a felony; receipt and possession of an unregistered firearm; concealment and storage of a stolen firearm; use of interstate facilities in the attempted commission of a murder-for-hire; and two counts of making false statements to FBI agents.”
Justin Sullivan (Photo: Mecklenburg County Sheriff’s Dept.)
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