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Mahin Khan: Muslim Terrorism Suspect Beaten Up By Co-Inmates Inside Arizona Prison

By Rahul Srinivas
Published on: 09:34 PST, Jul 16, 2016

Mahin Khan, an 18-year-old Muslim teenager from Tucson, Arizona, was earlier this month arrested after he was suspected of planning a string of terror attacks across Arizona. One day after his arrest on June 2, Khan was reportedly assaulted by other inmates inside a Maricopa County jail, NBC News reports. The report has only come to light nearly three weeks after it happened.

According to an official from the Maricopa County Sheriff Department, Khan suffered “non-life threatening injuries” as a result of the attack. Following the incident, Khan was moved to segregated housing in Lower Buckeye Jail, authorities said. Later, when Khan was offered to be placed in segregation, he declined the offer, a senior official from the sheriff’s office confirmed. Nevertheless, the Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio has ordered for Khan to be isolated from the rest of the jail population from now on.

The Inquisitr had on July 2 confirmed that Mahin Khan was arrested by the Federal Bureau of Investigation after he was suspected of planning terror attacks in the region. Khan had allegedly planned to attack several government buildings situated in Maricopa and Pima counties. He was under the scanner of a Joint Task Force of the FBI who were suspicious about his activities and eventually had him arrested. Upon further investigation, FBI claims to have found evidence that Mahin Khan had made contact with Pakistani terror group Tehrik-e Taliban Pakistan — also known as the Pakistani Taliban or TTP. The FBI also alleged that Khan was in touch with an unknown individual to source weapons for his attacks.

According to court documents, Khan had on April 16, this year, made a telephone call to an individual in which he discussed his plans for an attack. In the phone call, Khan is allegedly heard saying to the individual, “Have you ever been to the Mission Bay, California, area. That’s a pretty good target right there. There’s a lot of people there.”

Khan is allegedly believed to have later given access to his email account to this unknown person who found several email conversations that Khan had with people who said they could provide weapons to him. In one of those emails, Mahin Khan allegedly identifies himself as an “American Jihadist who supports ISIS.” In another email, written by Khan in February, Khan allegedly writes, “Need AK and pistols can u do that wanna take out marines and Jews”

Khan is scheduled to appear in court on Tuesday for another hearing regarding the case. At this time, it is not known whether he has an attorney.

Mahin Khan’s arrest came close on the heels of the deadly shooting in Orlando where another suspected Islamic terrorist named Omar Mateen opened fire inside a gay night club. The Pulse Orlando shooting has been described as the deadliest mass shooting incident ever in U.S. history and is also the biggest attack on U.S. soil since the 9/11 attacks of 2001. Globally too, there has been a spike in the number of terror attacks with several deadly attacks being reported from Bangladesh, Iraq, Turkey, and most recently France where more than 80 people were mowed down by a suspected terrorist.

This is not the first time that a Muslim jail inmate has been beaten up by fellow inmates. Back in September 2015, the Inquisitr had reported about the case of Carlos Larmond, a prisoner lodged in a Canadian prison who was beaten up by his fellow inmates after he tried to convert them to Islam.

[Image via Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office]

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