4 men convicted in NY synagogue-bombing plot

Four men snared last year in an FBI sting were convicted Monday of plotting to blow up New York City synagogues and shoot down military planes with the help of a paid informant who convinced them he was a terror operative.

The sting never put New Yorkers at risk. But the defendants "thought this was real - real bombs, real missiles - every step of the way," Assistant US Attorney David Raskin said during closing arguments.

A jury in federal court in Manhattan deliberated eight days before finding alleged mastermind James Cromitie and three co-defendants guilty of charges including conspiracy to use weapons of mass destruction and conspiracy to acquire and use anti-aircraft missiles to kill US officers and employees.

Cromitie and David Williams were convicted of all eight counts, while Onta Williams and Laguerre Payen were convicted of seven of eight counts. Sentencing was set for March 24, when the defendants could face up to life in prison.

Afterward, US Attorney Preet Bharara in a statement called homegrown terrorism a "serious threat" and added: "We are safer today as a result of these convictions." He said the defendants agreed to plant bombs and use missiles "they thought were very real weapons of terrorism."

Defense lawyers said they will appeal.

FBI sting operation

The FBI assigned Hussain, 53-year-old Pakistani immigrant, in 2008 to infiltrate a mosque in Newburgh, about an hour north of New York. After meeting Cromitie, he told him he was a representative of a Pakistani terror organization that was eager to finance a holy war on US soil.

Prosecutors alleged that in meetings with Hussain, the 44-year-old Cromitie hatched the scheme to blow up the synagogues in the Bronx with remote-controlled bombs. They say he also recruited the other men - Onta Williams, 34, David Williams, 29, and Payen, 28 - to help him shoot down cargo planes at the Air

National Guard base in Newburgh with heat-seeking missiles. Onta and David Williams are not related.

Agents arrested the men in 2009 after they planted the devices - fakes supplied by the FBI - in the Riverdale section of the Bronx while under heavy surveillance.

In one of several videos played at trial, the men could be seen practicing with a shoulder missile launcher and praying together in a bugged warehouse in Connecticut two weeks before the planned attack. At the end of the tape, Cromitie, two of his cohorts and the informant bow their heads in prayer.

In other tapes, Cromitie was heard ranting against Jews and expressing his desire to retaliate against US military aggression in the Middle East.

Prosecutors said the tapes proved the defendants didn't need prompting by the defendant to launch an attack.

"The FBI did exactly what it's supposed to do - it caught four dangerous men before they could do any real harm," Raskin said. "Ordinary people wouldn't even dream of what these defendants did."

• Follow Ynetnews on Facebook