April 08--Jonas Edmonds had just pleaded not guilty to plotting a terrorist attack on the Joliet Armory where his cousin trained for the Illinois National Guard when he spotted a relative sobbing softly in the federal courtroom gallery.
"No reason to cry," Edmonds said as two burly deputy U.S. marshals led him past his aunt, Tiffany Edmonds. "No reason at all."
The emotional moment came at the end of a routine hearing Wednesday for Edmonds, 29, who along with his cousin, Hasan Edmonds, 22, is charged with conspiring to provide material support and resources to the Islamic State terrorist organization.
Both men pleaded not guilty to a one-count indictment handed up last week. As the cousins sat shackled in the jury box listening to the proceedings, Jonas Edmonds yawned loudly and rubbed his face. Hasan remained quiet as prosecutors detailed the charge and explained they face a maximum of 15 years in prison if convicted.
When U.S. Magistrate Judge Sheila Finnegan asked the cousins if they had a grasp of the proceedings, Jonas answered sharply, "I understand," while his cousin said, "Yes," in a barely audible voice.
Tiffany Edmonds, who last week told reporters the charges against her nephews are "breaking up our whole family," declined to comment as she left the Dirksen U.S. Courthouse.
Prosecutors alleged Hasan and Jonas Edmonds had been aspiring terrorists for months when they arrived at the Joliet Armory on March 24 to scout the facility for an upcoming attack with AK-47 assault rifles and grenades.
Jonas Edmonds was going to carry out the attack while wearing Hasan Edmonds' uniform from his service with the Joliet-based 634th Brigade Support Battalion, authorities said. The two hoped to kill as many as 150, they said.
Hasan Edmonds was arrested the day after their scouting trip at Midway Airport as he prepared to board a flight to Detroit and on to Cairo to join terrorist fighters overseas, prosecutors said. Jonas Edmonds was arrested two hours later at his two-flat in an Aurora subdivision.
Federal agents had been tracking them since late last year when Hasan Edmonds exchanged Facebook messages with an agent posing as a militant about his desire to travel to the Middle East to join Islamic State.
According to the criminal complaint, Hasan Edmonds said in several online exchanges that if he was unable to get to Syria, he would stay in the U.S. and "fight and die here in the name of Allah." In a message Jan. 30, he told the undercover agent that the best way to beat the U.S. and its Army was to "break their will," according to the complaint.
In February, Jonas Edmonds began communicating online with another undercover operative who was posing as someone who could help the cousins in their quest to join Islamic State, according to the charges.
The cousins met with that purported accomplice to discuss the planned attack on the Joliet military facility, authorities said. According to the complaint, Jonas told the operative that after his cousin left for the Middle East, he planned to buy weapons to attack the base.
Last week, Tiffany Edmonds said the allegations against her nephews were "crushing" and difficult to understand.
"My family's not like that; we're Americans," she said. "We're happy people. They know we're not terrorists or people who want to kill people or evil."
The cousins are being held without bond.
jmeisner@tribpub.com
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