Yet Ahmed had a burning desire to join the global jihad, according to federal authorities. Beyond his alleged terrorist plot, which involved scouting Metro stations that he believed Al Qaeda would bomb, authorities said he wanted to travel to Afghanistan to kill American soldiers.
Ahmed, 34, immigrated to the United States in about 1993 and later became a citizen, according to an FBI affidavit. He lived in Staten Island, N.Y., and earned a bachelor’s degree in computer science in 2003 from the College of Staten Island before he moved to Virginia.
His LinkedIn page refers to a “political issue’’ between the computer science and engineering departments at the City College of New York that prevented him from receiving a master’s degree, but officials there said there were no records of Ahmed’s ever being a student.
He also wrote on the site that he was studying risk management and data security at Aspen University, an online school based in Denver.
The president of the school said Ahmed had been accepted as a student but has not taken any courses.
In Virginia, he drove a green 2005 Honda Accord, accruing a handful of traffic tickets.
His most recent job was doing network engineering on a contract basis for Ericsson Services Inc.
Ahmed previously worked on contracts with Verizon and Sprint, according to his LinkedIn profile.
READER COMMENTS »
View reader comments » Comment on this story »