Extremist group – On Monday, two people were accused of planning to attack the electrical system of Baltimore, Maryland.
According to court documents filed by federal investigators, a neo-Nazi leader intended to attack electrical substations with a lady he was seeing.
To utterly destroy Baltimore, they targeted the nearby factories.
What happened
Sarah Beth Clendaniel and Brandon Clint Russell were charged by the Justice Department for planning to damage the electrical grid.
Allegations claim that radical ideologies backed the plot against Maryland based on race or ethnicity.
Tom Sobocisnki, the head of the FBI field office in Baltimore, alleges that the two intended to “inflict maximum harm on the power grid.”
“The accused were not just talking, but taking steps to fulfill their threats and further their extremist goals,” said Sobocisnki.
The charges come after warnings from domestic experts that extremist groups are becoming more aggressive, trying to target power plants.
Extremist groups attacking
In the second half of 2022, two rounds were fired at a power substation in Moore County, North Carolina.
45,000 households and businesses lost energy as a result of the attack.
According to experts, domestic extremist groups may already be planning other attacks of this kind.
It comes after an unspecified FBI warning from November that warned that extremist organizations constituted a threat to cause societal unrest and call for further violence.
“This typically primitive style attack equals millions of dollars in damage,” said former US Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary for Infrastructure Protection Brian Harrell.
“If you were to shoot some very key components, you can quickly create an effect where this large multimillion transformer becomes essentially a paperweight.”
The Department of Energy reports that there were 25 violent attacks on US power plants last year.
80 vandalism occurrences and 57 allegations of suspicious conduct were also recorded.
The numbers show a rise from 2021 incidents, with 52 instances of vandalism, 32 reports of suspicious conduct, six violent attacks, and two sabotage complaints.
The majority of the reports most likely come from extremist group members.
Court appearance
District Court Judge Richard Collins met Sarah Beth Clendaniel for the first time on Monday afternoon in Baltimore’s downtown.
As she reviewed the accusations made against her in order to get ready for the hearing, she shook her head.
Clendaniel’s court-appointed counsel, Kirstin Hopkins, complied with the government’s request to keep the defendant incarcerated while additional hearings are scheduled.
In a later court appearance, she’ll probably enter a plea.
Her case will also have a preliminary hearing on February 15.
The first court appearance for Brandon Clint Russell was scheduled on Monday in Orlando.
There is, however, no current information on his hearing.
Conversations
During conversations that were recorded in January, Clendaniel is accused of telling FBI informants that the facilities were the target of a plot to attack the whole city.
She and Russell reportedly gave the source the facility information, according to the charging papers.
The informant added that Brandon Clint Russell also reportedly sent them a YouTube video of the attack on the North Carolina substation...Read More
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Source: Portland News