MIAMI, Fla. — Two men from Florida have plead guilty to charges that they helped a friend travel to Syria to join the barbaric Islamic group ISIS, which identifies itself as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria.
According to a press release from the U.S. Department of Justice, Dayne Antani Christian, 32, of Lake Park, and Darren Arness Jackson, 51, of West Palm Beach, aided Gregory Hubbard, 54 also of West Palm Beach, in his plans to fly Germany, and then travel by train to Turkey and cross into Syria.
Hubbard, a former U.S. Marine who had been obtaining help from the Veterans Administration for mental health issues, had been under watch by the government, and was befriended by an undercover FBI agent, who recorded conversations between the three men.
Since at least 2015, Christian, Jackson and Hubbard had been discussing their desire to join to ISIS, and Hubbard was supplied with weapons to practice his gun skills.
“At various times during the conspiracy both Christian and Jackson provided firearms (including an AK-47 style assault rifle provided by Christian) and firearms instruction so that Hubbard and the CHS could practice shooting at a remote area in Palm Beach County in preparation for their travel to Syria to join ISIL,” the DOJ outlines.
The undercover agent accompanied Hubbard as he was transported by Jackson to the Miami International Airport last July to board a flight to Germany. He was then arrested, as was Jackson. Christian was soon also taken into custody for his part in the conspiracy.
An indictment of “conspiring and attempting to provide material support to a designated foreign terrorist organization (ISIL)” was returned by a grand jury days later. Christian was also charged with four counts of felony possession of a firearm.
Christian pleaded guilty on March 29, and Jackson entered a guilty plea on April 4. Hubbard is scheduled to stand trial on Oct. 30. The men face a maximum of 20 years in prison if convicted, except for Christian, who faces an additional 10 year sentence for the firearm charges.
As previously reported, a South Carolina teen was also arrested last Thursday in a separate terror-related plot. Zakaryia Abdin, 18, of Ladson was taken into custody by the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF) as he was about to board a plane overseas to allegedly join ISIS.
Last Friday, two U.S. women were sentenced to 12 and 11 years in prison respectively for raising funds for the terror group al-Shabaab. Muna Osman Jama, 36, of Reston, Virginia, and Hinda Osman Dhirane, 46, of Kent, Washington, were accused of organizing the “Group of Fifteen,” which met in a web chat room to discuss funnelling funds to the organization.
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