Federal authorities arrested a Texas man accused in court records of trying to provide bomb-making materials to people he believed were ISIS members.
MIDLOTHIAN, Texas — Federal authorities arrested a 21-year-old Midlothian man days before Christmas in what court records describe as an FBI terrorism investigation involving alleged attempts to provide bomb-making materials to people he believed were members of ISIS.
Neighbors say law enforcement used a flashbang during the arrest.
“We heard a flash bang,” one neighbor said.
“Within moments, the police department said we have this person in custody,” another neighbor said.
Federal court records identify the suspect as John Michael Garza, who investigators say lived in the home with his grandfather. He is charged with attempting to provide material support or resources to a designated foreign terrorist organization. He could face as many as 20 years in prison.
According to an FBI agent’s affidavit, an undercover New York Police Department employee posing online as an ISIS fighter in Iraq began communicating with Garza in October.
The affidavit says Garza repeatedly shared ISIS propaganda, including a video depicting a suicide bombing, adding the comment, “My dream.”
In an Oct. 19 message, Garza wrote that he would be “100 percent happy to die for the cause of Allah.” Court records say he offered to send money and ultimately sent small sums.
In late November, after the fake ISIS fighter claimed to have recently purchased explosives, Garza wrote that he could buy materials for explosives.
“I will make so many bombs … and put them in my car packed with Bombs and try to kill as many kuffar police…” the records say he wrote in a Nov. 27 message.
“Kuffar” is apparently an Arabic word for “disbelievers.”
In early December, Garza was asked whether he would be “willing to provide explosive components to a ‘brother’ in the U.S. and teach him how to make a bomb,” court records show.
According to the records, Garza replied, “I’ve never made the bomb before, but you can make it with simple ingredients.”
On Dec. 18, records say Garza told the undercover account he was almost done with a detonator and sent a photo.
On Dec. 22, court records say Garza met with an undercover informant and handed over what he described as bomb-making components, including acetone, hydrogen peroxide, and sulfuric acid.
The records say he explained how the materials could be mixed to form a white powder, surrounded with nails, and offered to send an instructional video.
He was then taken into custody at the Midlothian home.
Patrick McLain, a Dallas attorney who specializes in national security and terrorism-related cases, says such cases often raise questions about intent and capacity.
“The question I have, though, is was this his idea?” McLain said.
McClain does not currently represent Garza but told WFAA that he has been contacted by people who know him.
“There are concerns that this young man was not in a mental state to agree to the sort of things that the affidavit purports that he agreed to,” McLain said. “That rings to true to my experience in these cases is that a person like this who is talking like this online is not a committed, trained member of ISIS or a terrorist organization. He is, at best, as the expression goes, a wannabe.”
On Tuesday, a federal magistrate ordered Garza held without bond pending trial, finding that “evidence establishes probable cause that Mr. Garza expressed over a substantial period of time a desire to kill others in the process of martyring himself.”
The judge ruled that no conditions of release would reasonably assure the safety of the community.