A 17-year-old from Virginia pleaded guilty Thursday to aiding the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria and helping a classmate travel to join the terrorist group, the Justice Department announced.
Ali Shukri Amin, a 17-year-old resident of Manassas, Va., pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court to providing material support to the group.
Amin used his Twitter account to “provide advice and encouragement” to the Islamic State and its supporters, according to the Justice Department. The advice primarily consisted of giving instructions on how to use Bitcoin, the virtual online currency, which the terrorist group has allegedly used to conceal its financial transactions, to help fund the terrorist group.
The Justice Department also said Amin helped to arrange travel for a classmate, Reza Niknejad, an 18-year-old Prince William County resident, who journeyed to Syria in January. Niknejad was charged Wednesday in the same court as Amin with conspiring to provide material support to terrorists, conspiring to provide material support to the Islamic State, and conspiring to kill and injure people abroad.
“Around the nation, we are seeing [the Islamic State] use social media to reach out from the other side of the world. Their messages are reaching America in an attempt to radicalize, recruit and incite our youth and others to support [the group’s] violent causes. This case serves as a wake-up call that [the Islamic State’s] propaganda and recruitment materials are in your communities and being viewed by your youth,” said Assistant Attorney General John P. Carlin.
U.S. Attorney Dana J. Boente of the Eastern District of Virginia said the plea demonstrates that people who use social media to aid terrorist-identified groups “will be identified and prosecuted with no less vigilance than those who travel to take up arms.”
