Authorities in the US announced on Wednesday that FBI officials thwarted a potential terrorist attack at the Mall of America in Bloomington, Minnesota. An 18-year-old, Sheikhdoon Abdullahi Mohamud, was arrested on Tuesday and faces one count of obtaining a firearm to carry out an act of terrorism.
According to the criminal complaint, Mr Mohamud was arrested in a public park after allegedly paying $600 to an undercover FBI employee, who was posing as a member of the Islamic State, for an AK-47 and 200 rounds of ammunition. The FBI had been investigating Mr Mohamud for nearly two years.
Messages with a confidential informant reportedly showed Mr Mohamud's intent to join terrorist organisations overseas, which later shifted to a planned attack in Minnesota when those initial plans failed. These messages date back to December 2024. A US attorney, Daniel Rosen, stated that agents "were able to detect a threat, and disrupt it, before the defendant carried out his intention to kill, in his words, maybe 30 to 60 people, as we allege in far greater detail in the complaint".
Mr Mohamud was reportedly seen on the mall's security cameras walking around and later robbing a Lids store at gunpoint before his apprehension, according to Minnesota police.