Judge Orders Release of Three of ‘Newburgh Four’ and Assails FBI’s Role in a Post-9/11 Terror Sting
Onta Williams, David Williams, and Laguerre Payen were ‘hapless, easily manipulated and penurious petty criminals’ caught up in a scheme driven by overzealous FBI agents and a dodgy informant, a federal judge says.
Three men convicted in a post-9/11 terrorism sting have been ordered freed from prison by a judge who deemed their lengthy sentences “unduly harsh and unjust” and decried the FBI’s role in radicalizing them in a plot to blow up New York synagogues and shoot down National Guard planes.
Onta Williams, David Williams, and Laguerre Payen — three of the men known as the “Newburgh Four” — were “hapless, easily manipulated and penurious petty criminals” caught up more than a decade ago in a scheme driven by overzealous FBI agents and a dodgy informant, Judge Colleen McMahon said in her ruling Thursday.
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