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BALTIMORE -- Federal prosecutors on Thursday charged a Maryland man with conspiracy to provide information to terrorists. The U.S. Attorney's Office of the Southern District of New York said Thursday afternoon that Mahmud Faruq Brent, also known as Mahmud Al Mutazzim, is in federal custody in New York. He was arrested Thursday in Newark, N.J. Brent, of Baltimore, faces charges of conspiring to provide resources to Lashkar-e-Taiba, which has been linked to bombings in India, from 2001 through the current year. Federal authorities, along with the Baltimore Joint Terrorism Task Force, searched Brent's northwest Baltimore residence following the arrest. Federal...

NEW YORK (Reuters) - A New York jazz musician and martial arts instructor was sentenced to 15 years in prison on Wednesday for agreeing to help train al Qaeda fighters in hand-to-hand combat. Tarik Shah, 44, a Muslim born and raised in New York, received the maximum sentence in Manhattan federal court under a plea agreement with U.S. prosecutors in which they dropped one of the terrorism charges against him. -snip-

NEW YORK --A Florida doctor was convicted Monday of providing material support to terrorists by agreeing to treat injured al-Qaida fighters so they could return to Iraq to battle Americans. Dr. Rafiq Abdus Sabir, 52, was convicted in federal court in Manhattan after a three-week trial that featured testimony by him and Ali Soufan, an FBI agent who posed as an al-Qaida recruiter in a sting operation that led to four arrests. When the verdict was read, Sabir looked straight ahead. Later, as he was escorted from the courtroom, he waved to supporters, who said, "Stay strong." His lawyer, Ed...

NEW YORK (AP) - A bookstore owner and a jazz musician agreed soon after the Sept. 11 attacks to try to help terrorists in Afghanistan buy weapons and communications equipment to fight American soldiers, the government charged Wednesday. Assistant U.S. Attorney Victor Hou said Abdulrahman Farhane, 51, and the musician, Tarik Shah, 42, spoke with an FBI informant about the plot in Farhane's bookstore in December 2001 "while the ruins of 9/11 were still smoldering." The prosecutor asked that Farhane be held without bail on charges of conspiring to provide material support to terrorists and trying to cover up his...

The federal charges lodged this week against Mahmud F. Brent read like a thriller, filled with tales of a clandestine FBI sting operation in a Maryland hotel room, terrorism training camps in the mountains of Pakistan and shadowy connections to al-Qaida. .....According to court papers, Brent, a 30-year-old West Baltimore man who drove a cab in Washington, conspired to help the armed wing of Lashkar-e-Taiba, a Pakistan-based religious organization labeled a terrorist group by the U.S. government. Brent, a U.S. citizen, was arrested in Orange, N.J., outside Newark on Thursday afternoon and brought to New York. About the same time,...

A Maryland man was charged with conspiracy to help a terrorist organization after he boasted that he went to Pakistan, attended terrorist training camps and agreed to provide whatever assistance was necessary, prosecutors said Thursday. Mahmud Faruq Brent, of Gwynn Oak, Md., was charged after a New York musician arrested on similar charges in May agreed to meet with him and let the FBI record the encounter, according to a joint release by federal prosecutors, the FBI and New York police. Brent was charged in a criminal complaint filed in U.S. District Court in Manhattan with conspiracy to provide material...

A Maryland man was charged with conspiring to help a terrorist organization after describing the time he spent at a terrorist training camp in Pakistan as "one of the better decisions in my life," prosecutors said Thursday. Mahmud Faruq Brent, of Gwynn Oak, Md., allegedly boasted that he had agreed to provide whatever assistance was necessary. Authorities began investigating Brent after they found an address book with telephone numbers for him when they arrested Tarik Shah, 42, of New York. Shah pleaded not guilty to terrorism charges earlier this summer. Brent was charged in a criminal complaint filed in federal...

NEW YORK - Two U.S. citizens accused of being al-Qaida loyalists pleaded not guilty Tuesday to terrorism charges. An indictment unsealed in federal court late Monday charged Tarik Shah, 42, of New York, and Dr. Rafiq Abdus Sabir, 50, of Boca Raton, Fla., each with a count of conspiring to provide material support to Osama bin Laden's terrorist network. They were arrested May 27 after a government sting, and were being held without bail. Each could face a maximum 15 years in prison if convicted. Prosecutors said Sabir, an Ivy League-educated doctor, agreed to treat jihadists, or holy warriors, in...

NEW YORK - (KRT) - The Bronx martial arts expert arrested in an alleged plot to build a secret al-Qaida training camp is a well-known city jazz musician who has backed greats like Abbey Lincoln and Betty Carter, friends said Tuesday. Tarik Shah, 42, has played bass at local clubs for years, and fellow musicians said they've never heard him espouse an allegiance to Osama bin Laden. "This man talks about music. That's all he talks about," said pianist Donald Smith, 61, who last month played with Shah at St. Nick's Pub in Harlem. "The only thing we know is...

A New York martial arts expert who is charged with conspiring to help train al Qaeda members is the victim of a "desperate prosecution on the government's behalf," his lawyer said on Tuesday. Tarik Ibn Osman Shah was arrested on Friday in New York after a two-year sting operation in which prosecutors said he had been taped pledging support to Osama bin Laden. He is charged with one count of conspiring to provide material support to al Qaeda, a designated foreign terrorist organization. Shah, who is also a professional jazz musician, was presented briefly in Manhattan federal court on Tuesday...

NEW YORK — Authorities said Sunday that Rafiq Abdus Sabir (search), 50, a Boca Raton physician, and Tarik Shah (search), 42, a self-described martial arts expert in New York, conspired to treat and train terrorists. Both are American citizens. Both men were scheduled to be arraigned Tuesday in federal court, Shah in New York and Sabir in Florida, according to a news release from U.S. Attorney David Kelley in Manhattan. It was not immediately clear who would represent them in court. If convicted, each man faces a maximum sentence of 15 years in prison and a fine of up to...

Scouted L.I. for camp - feds The son of a former Malcolm X aide was nabbed yesterday, along with a Florida doctor, in a plot to start an Al Qaeda training camp in the U.S. - even scouting out a Long Island warehouse for a terror school, officials said last night. Tarik Shah, 38, a self-proclaimed martial arts expert from the Bronx, and Dr. Rafiq Sabir, 50, presented themselves as a "package deal" to help Muslim "brothers" wage jihad here and in the Middle East, said Manhattan U.S. Attorney David Kelley. Kelley said Shah - son of Lieutenant X, one...

A Palm Beach County doctor arrested on terrorism-related charges plotted to treat "wounded jihadists" in a plan hatched with a New York martial-arts expert to recruit and train al-Qaida members, federal officials said Sunday. Both men were arrested during the weekend. The second suspect, Tarik Ibn Osman Shah, 42, was apprehended in the Bronx on Saturday in the same investigation that snared Rafiq Abdus Sabir, 50, an emergency-room doctor who lives in a gated community west of Boca Raton. The men, U.S. citizens, were charged with conspiracy to provide material support to al-Qaida, the terrorist organization led by Osama bin...

NEW YORK (AP) - The FBI arrested a Florida doctor and a New York martial arts expert on federal terrorism charges, saying they conspired to treat and train terrorists, prosecutors announced Sunday. Rafiq Abdus Sabir, a Boca Raton physician, and Tarik Shah, a self-described martial arts expert in New York, were both charged in Manhattan federal court with conspiring to provide material support to al-Qaida, according to the U.S. attorney's office for the Southern District of New York. New York police spokesman Paul Browne said Shah was arrested early Friday. Florida authorities said Sabir was arrested Saturday. Both are American...