Small groups now a large threat in U.S.

After more than a decade of warning that the greatest threat of homegrown terrorism for the United States came from individual lone-wolf radicals, the FBI and other law enforcement agencies have begun focusing on what they say is a greater threat -- small, anonymous groups of disaffected men who radicalize one another and turn to violence.

Federal officials say that most of the domestic terrorist threats now under investigation involve such groups, though they continue to rank Al Qaeda as the greatest danger globally.

Known among counter-terrorism officials as BOGs, for “bunch of guys,” or GOGs, for “group of guys,” the cells may offer greater opportunities for detection and infiltration than the lone-wolf threat because they are more numerous and most members are amateurs.

But they present daunting challenges as well. They are difficult to detect because most lack formal structure or prominent leaders and have little or no contact with Al Qaeda or other known terrorist organizations. They can plan multiple attacks, use varied weapons and tactics, and draw on a wider range of resources than an individual could, officials say.

More vexing still, they say, is the dynamic at work inside these groups. Most members start out as merely alienated and angry. They tend to radicalize and egg one another on with the help of the Internet, increasing the likelihood of talk turning into action. Yet it’s difficult to know which of the many such groups -- some as small as two or three individuals -- might go all the way to launching an attack.

Such groups form so spontaneously and “self-radicalize” so quickly that the first sign of their existence might be an attack, Samuel J. Rascoff of the New York Police Department said at a recent counter-terrorism summit in Florence, Italy.

Rascoff, director of intelligence analysis for the NYPD, said that BOGs could “serve as an echo chamber,” amplifying the influence of the most radical members.

Some defense lawyers and other critics say the threat is overblown, and often arises from law enforcement informants who entrap or even push small-time troublemakers into plotting attacks.

“There are very many cases in which the informants are the ones creating the terrorist plots,” said Rocco C. Cipparone Jr., a defense attorney in one small-group case.

To illustrate the small-group threat, authorities cite the case of Derrick Shareef, a young Muslim convert. Shareef was arrested near Chicago in December on suspicion of plotting to use hand grenades to attack holiday shoppers.

Originally, authorities described Shareef as a loner. Now, they say that he was plotting with another American Muslim convert who allegedly had ties to terrorists in the United Kingdom. The two were discussing a variety of targets and tactics, including sniper attacks on U.S. troops and assaults on military recruiting stations, a federal prosecutor said at a July 28 court hearing.

The new view of Shareef resembles alleged plots against the Ft. Dix Army base in New Jersey and John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York in the spring, and Chicago’s Sears Tower in June 2006, authorities say.

At the Florence conference, which was sponsored by New York University’s Center on Law and Security, security officials Armando Spataro of Italy and Baltasar Garzon of Spain said their nations were seeing a sharp increase in such groups.

“It’s an international phenomenon,” according to one U.S. intelligence official, who said such cells were being monitored in the United States, Canada, Europe, the Middle East, North Africa and elsewhere.

“There is no useful profile to assist law enforcement or intelligence to predict who will follow this trajectory of radicalization. Rather, the individuals who take this course begin as ‘unremarkable’ from various walks of life,” the NYPD said in a report released Wednesday.

“It is a phenomenon that occurs because the individual is looking for an identity and a cause and unfortunately, often finds them in extremist Islam,” the report said.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations said the NYPD report may result in all U.S. Muslims being viewed with suspicion. The report’s “sweeping generalizations and mixing of unrelated elements may serve to cast a pall of suspicion over the entire American Muslim community,” Parvez Ahmed, chairman of the council’s board, said in a statement.

Law enforcement officials say BOGs present unique challenges.

“If we don’t bump into them directly or have someone involved in some form of interaction with them, we’ll have a difficult time finding them,” said Arthur M. Cummings II, the FBI’s deputy assistant director for counter-terrorism.

Marc Sageman, a former CIA case officer and psychiatrist credited with articulating the “bunch of guys” concept, said when it comes to carrying out an attack, individual members “don’t have the courage to do it, but collectively they do.”

Some of the alleged plotters, such as those in the Sears Tower and JFK airport cases -- and even the 23-year-old Shareef -- have been portrayed as bumblers. However, said the FBI’s Cummings: “It could be a fatal mistake to minimize the danger that guys like that pose. It takes very little in the way of skill to go out and murder somebody.”

More than seven years ago Canadian authorities were watching a small group of Algerian men who seemed angry but so incapable of inflicting real harm that investigators dubbed them just a “bunch of guys.”

Officials realized that they had underestimated the group when one of its members, Ahmed Ressam, was caught with a car trunk full of explosives that he intended to detonate at Los Angeles International Airport on the eve of the 2000 millennium.

“The Canadians made a mistake. They didn’t know what was happening right in front of them. These guys were radicalizing themselves,” said Sageman, author of the upcoming book “Leaderless Jihad.”

U.S. authorities began taking seriously the threat from small homegrown groups in 2005. That August, Kevin Lamar James and three other men were indicted on federal charges of conspiracy to attack Los Angeles-area military facilities and synagogues and of attempting to fund their campaign by robbing gas stations.

Shareef’s case is similar to many of the others in that one of the people he confided in was an FBI informant.

A bureau affidavit says that Shareef, a former video-store clerk, became acquainted with the informant in Rockford, Ill.

The informant, who has not been publicly identified, began taping their conversations, which make it clear that both men were encouraging each other to advance the plot.

Shareef, from the small town of Genoa between Rockford and Chicago, said he was interested in killing Jews, attacking a government building or killing a judge, according to an FBI affidavit.

Ultimately, Shareef and the man he believed to be his partner settled on a plan to detonate hand grenades in garbage cans at a mall northwest of Chicago on the Friday before Christmas.

“I am from America, and this tape is to let you guys know, who disbelieve in Allah, to let the enemies of Islam know, and to let the Muslims alike know, that the time for jihad is now,” Shareef said in a martyrdom video, according to the affidavit.

The informant arranged for Shareef to trade two stereo speakers for four grenades and a semiautomatic handgun from an undercover law enforcement officer. The FBI arrested him in a parking lot after the deal was made, the affidavit says.

Shareef has pleaded not guilty to terrorism-related charges. His family and work associates have said that they had no reason to believe he was engaged in terrorist activity. His attorney, Michael B. Mann, had no comment.

Recently, federal authorities asserted that Shareef also was engaged in a conspiracy with a former U.S. sailor named Hassan Abujihaad. In 2000 and 2001, Abujihaad, whose real name is Paul R. Hall, allegedly exchanged e-mails with suspected terrorist leader Babar Ahmad in London, and has been charged with providing Ahmad’s website with information about battleship movements.

After Abujihaad left the military, he and Shareef became friends in Phoenix. Between 2003 and 2006, the two discussed killing U.S. troops by sniper fire and attacking recruiting installations, Assistant U.S. Atty. Stephen B. Reynolds said in court.

Abujihaad’s attorney, Daniel LaBelle, said he was waiting for prosecutors to present details of their claims. He said the case in which Abujihaad had been charged was weak.

Shareef also introduced Abujihaad to the undercover informant, authorities say.

Two days after Shareef’s arrest, Abujihaad allegedly negotiated to buy two AR-15 assault rifles from the informant.

Later that day, the informant told Abujihaad about Shareef’s arrest and said, “He was acting like you and him were tight like brothers,” according to the affidavit.

“We are tight like that,” Abujihaad allegedly responded.

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josh.meyer@latimes.com