WASHINGTON — An 18-year-old man from New Jersey was arrested in an alleged plot to attack an electrical substation to advance his white supremacist views, officials say.
According to the U.S. Department of Justice, Andrew Takhistov was arrested on Wednesday at the Newark Liberty International Airport.
Officials say Takhistov was traveling to Paris, and then to Ukraine to join the Russian Volunteer Corps, a pro-Ukrainian group fighting Russian forces.
According to the DOJ, in January Takhistov started having conversations with a person he didn’t know was an undercover agent, and shared with the agent a plan to attack an electrical substation in the United States.
“This complaint alleges that the defendant’s posts referenced Adolf Hitler, encouraged violence against Black and Jewish communities, praised mass shooters, and discussed causing death and destruction on a large scale,” said U.S. Attorney Philip R. Sellinger for the District of New Jersey in a news release.
“The defendant was allegedly enroute to join the Russian Volunteer Corps, which he described as specializing in assassinations, attacks on power grids, and other infrastructure sabotage, so that he could act on his violent plans. We will not tolerate these kinds of alleged terroristic threats, and working with our partners, we will always be ready to root out and bring to justice anyone who attempts to carry out these acts.”
More on the arrest and allegations.
