Washington, D.C.
An Ohio truck driver who met Osama bin Laden has admitted that he plotted with al Qaida to destroy the Brooklyn Bridge. FBI officials said this week that the man, Iyman Faris, had cooperated with investigators since secretly pleading guilty in May. Faris visited New York in 2002 to inspect the bridge, but he told his contacts that the plan to sever its suspension cables with blowtorches wouldn’t work. Faris, a naturalized U.S. citizen from Kashmir, India, also allegedly looked into sabotaging railroad lines to cause derailments, but never carried out the attacks. Faris’ ex-wife said she felt “physically ill” when she heard the news. “I’m still in shock,” she said. “It just doesn’t seem like the person I knew.”
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