Radicals charged in plot to kill Fort Dix soldiers

May 8, 2007

Fort Dix, New Jersey - The U.S. government has charged five alleged "Islamic radicals" with involvement in a plot to kill U.S. soldiers at Fort Dix in New Jersey.

The U.S. government has charged five alleged Islamic radicals with involvement in a plot to kill U.S. soldiers at Fort Dix in New Jersey.

A sixth was charged with aiding and abetting the illegal possession of firearms by three of the others.

The group's intention "was to conduct an armed assault on the army base and to kill as many soldiers as possible," the U.S. Attorney's Office for New Jersey said.

The six were arrested Monday night in Cherry Hill, N.J., "as two of the defendants were meeting a confidential government witness to purchase three AK-47 automatic machine guns and four semi-automatic M-16s to be used in an attack they had been planning from at least January 2006, according to criminal complaints unsealed this morning," the U.S. Attorney's Office said in a news release.

The six -- three of them brothers -- heard the charges against them Tuesday in federal court. Six complaints were filed, each naming one of the six as defendant.