He Offered Ammo To Hezbollah: Fed
A citizen of India and a Queens resident was found guilty last Wednesday, Mar. 28, for attempting to provide support to Hezbollah, a designated foreign terrorist organization in the Middle East.
Patrick Nayyar, 48, was convicted on counts of five criminal counts related to the case following a sevenday jury trial in Manhattan before U.S. District Judge Robert W. Sweet. Sentencing is scheduled to take place on Sept. 25; he faces a maximum sentence of 75 years in federal prison.
According to the superceding indictment filed by the office of U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York Preet Bharara, between July 2009 and September 2009, Nayyar and his co-conspirator, Conrad Stanisclaus Mulholland, agreed to provide weapons, ammunition, and vehicles to Hezbollah, a U.S. designated foreign terrorist organization based in Lebanon.
During a series of meetings with a confidential informant working with the FBI, who represented himself as able to deliver materials to Hezbollah, Nayyar and Mulholland agreed to sell guns, ammunition, vehicles, bulletproof vests, and night vision goggles to the confidential informant. During these meetings, Nayyar and Mulholland provided the confidential informant with a handgun, a box of ammunition, and a pick-up truck, believing that he would deliver the items to Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Nayyar was charged in the Southern District of New York in October 2009, following his arrest in the Eastern District of New York at his residence in Queens in September 2009 on a separate charge.
He was convicted last Wednesday of conspiring to provide material support or resources to a foreign terrorist organization; attempting to provide material support or resources to a foreign terrorist organization; conspiring to make or receive a contribution of funds, goods, or services to, and for the benefit of, Hezbollah; attempting to make a contribution of funds, goods, or services to, and for the benefit of, Hezbollah; and conspiring to traffic in firearms and ammunition.
Mulholland, 45, who is not a citizen of the U.S. and resides abroad, left the U.S. before charges were filed and remains at large. The charges against Mulholland are pending, and he is presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty.
Bharara praised the investigative work of the FBI and the New York Joint Terrorism Task Force.
The case is being handled by the U.S. Attorney’s Office’s Terrorism and International Narcotics Unit. Assistant United States Attorneys Sean Buckley and Stephen Ritchin are in charge of the prosecution.
