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Hearing is delayed on alleged terror plot

E-mail|Link|Comments () October 29, 2009 06:18 PM

By Shelley Murphy, Globe Staff

A hearing on whether a Sudbury man should remain jailed while awaiting trial on terrorism charges has been posponed for a couple of weeks because his lawyer said he needs more time to prepare for it.

Tarek Mehanna, 27, is accused of plotting with two other men to shoot shoppers at a suburban mall, join a terrorist training camp, kill American soldiers overseas, and assassinate two unnamed government officials. He was arrested last week on a charge that he conspired to provide material support to terrorists.

Today, US Magistrate Judge Leo T. Sorokin postponed the hearing, which had been schedueld for Friday in US District Court in Boston, until Nov. 12.

Mehanna's lawyer, J.W. Carney Jr., told the court that he needed additional time to prepare for the hearing because of the seriousness of the charges and because prosecutors had just provided him with a 74-page proffer and memorandum in support of their motion to have Mehanna jailed without bail until the case is resolved.

An FBI affidavit filed in court last week after Mehanna was arrested alleged that he and a friend, Ahmad Abousamra, 28, formerly of Mansfield, plotted with an unidentified cooperating witness from 2001 to May 2008 to carry out terrorist acts.

The affidavit alleges that Mehanna and Abousamra tried to join a terrorist training camp overseas, but couldn't find one that would take them. It also says they plotted to attack shoppers at a mall, then scrapped the plan because they couldn't get their hands on automatic weapons. The FBI alleges that Abousamra, who has not been charged, left Boston for Syria shortly after he was questioned by the Joint Terrorism Task Force in December 2006.