Massive Tragedy Prevented, FBI Arrests ‘ISIS’ Teen Planning Shooting Spree at Churches

Here’s some good news for a change.

A shooting-attack spree on 21 churches was prevented, saving who knows how many lives.

18 year old Alexander Scott Mercurio, that seems to love ISIS, was apprehened before he could commit his planned attacks.

And just in time, too.

The FBI stepped in a day before the scheduled bloodshed.

Sadly, this guy looks like he drank the kool-aid of liberal propaganda, which had him linking Christianity to ‘White supremacy’.

Another confused soul that was recruited to do the Enemy’s bidding.

An Idaho teen inspired by ISIS, 18-year-old Alexander Scott Mercurio, had been planning for months attacks on churches. He didn’t know he was planning with FBI informants. https://t.co/0ogC0X6Gvy

— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) April 10, 2024

NBC News reports:

An Idaho teenager was arrested and accused of planning to kill churchgoers during services across his hometown in the name of the Islamic State group, authorities have said.

Alexander Scott Mercurio, 18, from Coeur d’Alene, was arrested early Saturday as part of the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force investigation, a day before prosecutors say he planned to carry out his attack.

He is accused of “attempting to provide material support and resources to ISIS,” according to a federal criminal complaint filed in Idaho on Monday.

The FBI said he was actively planning to attack churches Sunday in Coeur d’Alene, a town 30 miles east of Spokane, Washington, using “weapons, including knives, firearms, and fire,” a statement said. The attack was timed to coincide with the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, investigators said.

According to a direct message sent to an FBI “confidential human source,” quoted in a lengthy affidavit attached to the criminal complaint, Mercurio set out his plan in detail.

“Stop close by the church, equip the weapon(s) and storm the temple, kill as many people as possible before they inevitably disperse/scatter, then burn the temple to the ground and flee the scene,” Mercurio allegedly wrote. He said he would then repeat this for all 21 churches in the town, according to prosecutors.

As part of their investigation, prosecutors said, FBI sources met with Mercurio in person and heard him express support for ISIS and outline his plan to incapacitate his father with a metal pipe and restrain him, then take his firearms and attack a local church.

“His plan grew more precise as he eventually identified the church and date on which he planned to attack,” the affidavit said, adding that he had pledged his allegiance to ISIS and said he was prepared to die while killing others on its behalf.

Law enforcement officers found an ISIS flag, butane canisters, lighters, handcuffs, a knife, a pipe and a machete at his house during his arrest, as well as several firearms belonging to his father, which he allegedly planned to take.

Mercurio also spread ISIS propaganda online and discussed ways to support the group financially as well as traveling to west Africa to help its operations there, the affidavit said.

The FBI said it became aware of Mercurio during an investigation into a fundraising network that uses cryptocurrency and other platforms to support ISIS in Syria and its Afghan affiliate ISIS Wilayat Khorasan, known as ISIS-K.

That investigation found that Mercurio and at least three other suspects who were not identified in the documents were financially supporting someone only referred to as “Individual 2” in Gaza, the Palestinian enclave that has faced widespread destruction from six months of the Israel-Hamas war.