New York City Mayor Eric Adams announced the arrest of two people whose social media posts were monitored by authorities about the attack on a synagogue in the city.
“This was not an empty threat,” Adams said at a press conference with officials from the FBI, the Transportation Administration and other agencies involved in the arrest of 21-year-old Christopher Brown and 22-year-old Matthew Marer. “That was a real threat.”
According to a complaint filed against him, Brown tweeted a series of threats, including what he wrote on Thursday: “I will ask the priest if I should shoot the synagogue and die” and then on Friday: “This time I .”
Michael Driscoll, head of the FBI in New York, explained that authorities linked the tweets to Brown and that Marer was his accomplice.
Authorities said Brown had a large knife, a mask and a swastika fragment when he was arrested.
A bag containing a pistol and 17 bullets was also confiscated at Marer’s home.
Brown, who is accused of making a terrorist threat in addition to the weapons charge, admitted to police that he ran a white supremacist group on Twitter and that Marer was one of his followers.
Mayor Adams, a Democrat and former police officer, said threats against Jews or any other group should be taken seriously.
“America must defeat the growing threat of domestic terrorism. He is real… He is here and we need to have a systematic approach to him,” he added.
Source: a. B