Two Suburban Zion Men Charged With Conspiring With ISIS, Posed For 'Terror Pics' At State Park
CHICAGO (CBS) -- Two suburban men were arrested Wednesday on charges that they conspired to provide material support to the Islamic State.
Joseph D. Jones, 35, of Zion, and Edward Schimenti, 35, of Zion were charged with "conspiring to knowingly provide and attempt to provide material support and resources to the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS)."
Jones also went by the name of "Yusuf Abdulhaqq" and Schimenti went by the name of "Abdul Wali."
The two men are scheduled Wednesday to make an initial court appearance at 3 p.m. before U.S. Magistrate Judge M. David Weisman in Chicago.
Authorities are also executing Wednesday a search warrant of Jones' residence in Zion.
"Jones and Schimenti pledged their allegiance to ISIS and advocated on social media for violent extremism in support of the terrorist group. In the fall of 2015, the pair befriended three individuals whom Jones and Schimenti believed were fellow ISIS devotees. Unbeknownst to Jones and Schimenti, two of the individuals were undercover FBI employees and the third individual was cooperating with law enforcement and was not an ISIS supporter," according to the criminal complaint filed in U.S. District Court in Chicago.
ISIS Conspiracy Complaint by John Dodge on Scribd
Jones and Schimenti met with the undercover FBI employees over several months in areas of Waukegan, Zion, Bridgeview, North Chicago, Highland Park and Chicago, where they discussed their devotion to ISIS and their commitment to Islamic State principles, the complaint states.
The men also shared photos of themselves holding the Islamic State flag the Illinois Beach State Park in Zion, according to the complaint. One of the men said, in a recorded conversation, he would like to see the ISIS flag "on top of the White House," the complaint states.
Schimenti trained at a gym in Zion with a cooperating source. He believed the cooperating source was going overseas to fight for ISIS and told the source that the exercises would "make you good, you know, in the battlefield," according to the complaint.
Jones and Schimenti furnished last month several phones, believed to be used to detonate explosive devices in ISIS attacks; and gave the devices to the cooperating source, who the men believed was traveling to Syria to fight with ISIS.
The men met the source at O'Hare International Airport. Schimenti told the source to "drench that land with ... blood," according to the complaint.
The Department of Justice reminds the public that the complaint is not evidence of guilt.
The charge in the complaint is punishable by up to 20 years in prison, according to the Department of Justice.
