Danish terror plot: 2 Chicago friends accused of scheming to attack Danish newspaper over cartoons about Muhammad Federal authorities say operation li

Danish terror plot: 2 Chicago friends accused of scheming to attack Danish newspaper over cartoons about Muhammad
Federal authorities say operation linked to al-Qaida
By Hal Dardick, Jeff Coen and Stacy St. Clair
Copyright © 2009, Chicago Tribune
October 28, 2009
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-terror-plot-28-oct28,0,7626261.story


As boys, David Coleman Headley and Tahawwur Hussain Rana studied military strategies at one of Pakistan's most storied cadet colleges.

As men, they reunited in Chicago to conspire with international terrorists plotting to take revenge on a Danish newspaper for publishing cartoons about the Prophet Muhammad that outraged the Muslim world, federal prosecutors charged Tuesday.

Federal authorities say they foiled the childhood friends' plan -- an al-Qaida-linked operation code-named "the Mickey Mouse Project" -- before it was set to be carried out.

Headley, 49, traveled to Denmark twice this year to conduct surveillance missions on the Copenhagen and Aarhus offices of the Jyllands-Posten newspaper, prosecutors said in criminal complaints unsealed in U.S. District Court in Chicago.

During at least one of his scouting trips, Headley claimed to be a consultant for a North Side business owned by Rana called First World Immigration Services, prosecutors said. Headley, who changed his name from Daood Gilani in 2006, allegedly to avoid raising red flags when he traveled, was charged with conspiracy to commit terrorist acts. Rana, 48, was accused of financially supporting Headley, arranging his overseas travel and discussing potential targets with him.

Authorities said Headley was to attack the Jyllands-Posten office or launch a more focused attempt at killing cartoonist Kurt Westergaard and an editor there. The drawings depicting Muhammad with a lit bomb for a turban touched off violent riots after being published in 2005.

The alleged plot called for "a combined arms attack" involving firearms and explosives, a source familiar with the investigation said. Authorities believe planning for the attack was in its final stages.

In Tuesday's editions, the Chicago Tribune first reported the Chicago connections to the alleged international terrorist plot.

A hint of the scope of the probe first became public Oct. 18 when some 80 federal agents armed with assault weapons and supported by an armed helicopter and an airplane raided a farm owned by Rana in the small town of Kinsman, about 80 miles southwest of Chicago.

Mayor Mark Harlow said the town of 110 had never seen such a commotion. On Tuesday about 100 goats, cows and sheep at Rana's small meat processing facility were being tended in a muddy field by a single worker who went inside before he could be questioned by a reporter.

On Oct. 18, authorities also searched Headley's home near Artesian and Devon avenues and Rana's Chicago home in the 6000 block of North Campbell Avenue, where he was arrested. Based on items seized during the raids, the source said, authorities believe Rana was using his Immigration business to arrange for the travel of people involved in other extremist groups.

Rana's lawyer, Patrick Blegen, denied the charges against his client, calling Rana "a well-respected businessman in the Chicagoland community." Lawyers for Headley had no immediate comment.

Federal authorities detailed their case against the two men in court documents that included e-mail and telephone traffic on the alleged plot to attack the newspaper. While making his plans, Headley allegedly stayed in contact with two Pakistani terror groups, including one with links to al-Qaida.

Jakob Scharf, the head of the Danish Security and Intelligence Service, described the alleged plan as "serious" but not imminent and said it drew on Headley's "very extensive contacts with leading militant extremists in Pakistan." The source familiar with the investigation said authorities have identified individuals who were enlisted to carry out the attack.

Headley, a U.S. citizen, was arrested Oct. 3 by the FBI at O'Hare International Airport with videotapes of Copenhagen and the newspaper offices in his luggage. Both he and Rana, a Pakistani native with Canadian citizenship, are in federal custody in Chicago, the U.S. attorney's office said.

In admissions he allegedly made after his arrest, Headley told federal authorities he had been working with Lashkar-e-Taiba -- a Pakistan-based radical Islamic group that opposes Indian rule in divided Kashmir -- since before 2006.

Although he cooperated extensively with federal authorities, he did not turn on Rana, his close friend, the source said. But authorities began looking into Rana last summer, after first identifying Headley as a suspect and noting he spent a lot of time with Rana, the source added.

Headley has provided a great deal of other information identifying other alleged activities and terrorists, the source said.

Various alumni directories name Headley and Rana as classmates at Cadet College Hasan Abdal, Pakistan's first military prep school, in the entry class of 1974.

Last year Headley allegedly posted messages on an Internet board for graduates of the military school that he remained angry about the images. "I feel disposed towards violence for the offending parties," prosecutors alleged he wrote.

During one of his visits to Denmark, Headley posed as an international businessman who wanted to place ads in Jyllands-Posten, Denmark's largest newspaper.

Danish officials have increased patrols around the newspaper's office after the arrests. Editor Jorn Mikkelsen said his newsroom worried about its safety since publishing the cartoon in 2005, but the detailed plot outlined in the court documents rattled the staff Tuesday. "It's scary, of course. We're kind of shocked," he said.

Investigators said Headley tried to carefully cover his tracks, renting a Chicago apartment in the name of a deceased person and using a cell phone in the name of another. Federal officials in a statement said the alleged plot involved "no imminent danger in the Chicago area" and added that the charges were not related to recent terror-plot arrests in Boston, New York, Colorado, Texas or central Illinois.

Rana is scheduled to appear in federal court Wednesday for a detention hearing.

Tribune reporter Kim Janssen contributed to this report.

hdardick@tribune.com

jcoen@tribune.com

sstclair@tribune.com