Agencies: Homegrown radicals inside U.S.

http://www.thestate.com/mld/thestate/news/nation/14807839.htm

Agencies: Homegrown radicals inside U.S.

WASHINGTON - U.S. counterterrorism officials say they are uncovering homegrown Islamic radicals inside the United States who lack formal ties to al-Qaida and operate independently.

Those independent qualities - combined with the radicals' ability to organize and plot on the Internet - make them particularly difficult to disrupt, retired Vice Adm. John Scott Redd, director of the National Counterterrorism Center, told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Tuesday.

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Redd pointed to what he said were three potential homegrown organizations that have been disrupted in the U.S. in just over a year:

_ Two Atlanta-area men, charged earlier this year in a terrorism case, have been publicly linked to some of the Canadian suspects. Prosecutors have said the two traveled to Washington to shoot "casing videos" of the Capitol and other potential targets. The lawyer for one suspect has insisted it wasn't part of any terrorism plot.

_ In Torrance, Calif., the head of a radical Islamic prison gang and three others were indicted last year on federal charges of planning terrorist attacks against U.S. military facilities, the Israeli Consulate and other Los Angeles-area targets.