N.Y. Police Used Immigrant as Informant

As part of its anti-terrorism operations, the New York Police Department used an Egyptian immigrant who reported to detectives on “everything, good or bad,” and testified Tuesday against an accused terrorist, Reuters reports.

Osama Eldawoody, 50, testified in the trial of 24-year-old Shahawar Matin Siraj of Pakistan, who faces allegations of plotting to bomb a Manhattan subway station, according to Reuters.

Eldawoody, who infiltrated a New York mosque as part of his informant work, secretly taped conversations with Siraj that revealed the Pakistani’s idea to bomb the Herald Square station and a plan to blow up bridges, although none of these ideas came to fruition, Reuters reports.

Defense attorneys, however, claim that Eldawoody misused the authority granted to him by police and entrapped Siraj, according to Reuters.

The New York Police have gained notoriety for their extensive antiterrorism activities following the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center towers and the Pentagon. More than 1,000 of the department’s 37,800 officers work on daily counterterrorism duties, according to Reuters.

After pushing for increased surveillance of mosques that were suspected of harboring Islamic militants, the department in 2003 was granted expanded surveillance powers by a federal judge, Reuters reports.

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— Compiled by Dave Gradijan