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Aws Mohammed Naser (Michigan Dept. of Corrections photo)
A former language contractor for the U.S. Marines in the Middle East, who authorities say became radicalized and had a bomb-making lab and multiple drones in his Westland home, was sentenced last week in Detroit federal court to 20 years in prison for attempting to provide material support to the terrorist organization ISIS.
The sentencing capped another troubling chapter in the life of Aws Mohammed Naser, 38, who battled with personal problems and anger issues, had difficulties fitting in, holding a job, and nurturing loving relationships, and who ultimately found purpose and passion in radical Islam and anti-American sentiment.
A federal jury last year found that Naser twice attempted to provide material support to ISIS in the form of personnel services from 2012 to 2017, according to a grand jury indictment. He was also found guilty of being a felon in possession of a destructive device.
“This self-professed ‘soldier of the Caliphate’ and ‘son of the Islamic State’ has now faced American justice," said Detroit U.S. Attorney Jerome F. Gorgon Jr. in a statement last week after sentencing. "We welcomed this traitor into our nation with open arms, and he repaid us by building a bomb and helping our great enemy."
At the time of sentencing, Naser had been in prison for several years for violating parole on an armed robbery conviction. His attorneys, in a sentencing memorandum, asked the judge to consider that Naser had changed and had been involved with Parents 4 Peace (P4P), a non-profit deradicalization organization.
Born in Baghdad, Iraq, Naser entered the U.S. as a refugee at age 12 and lived in upstate New York with his family.
After Sept. 11, 2001, his New York classmates treated him differently, taunting him and calling him names like "terrorist" and "Osama," according to his attorneys' sentencing memorandum. He started to talk back, fight, and get into trouble.
Feeling they were no longer welcome, the family moved to Dearborn. Naser was 15.
"Despite the move, Aws did not feel that the bullying subsided, and he and his siblings continued to be taunted," his attorneys wrote. "Aws felt middle and high school were negative and mean environments where his identity was often reduced to his religion."
Naser dropped out of Fordson High School in Dearborn in the 11th grade and got a GED.
In 2006, when he was 18, he was convicted of disorderly conduct on school property for fighting. In 2007, Naser assaulted his mother and was sentenced to 12 months' probation.
Authorities said during an argument, Naser shoved his mother over a couch, causing it to flip over and her to fall to the ground. He then stood over her, pointing his finger and swearing before violently throwing an object at the wall.
Translator for Marines
In 2007, at age 19, before becoming radicalized, Naser worked as a contract linguist for the U.S. Marine Corps in Iraq and Kuwait, helping translate for ground troops. He returned from Iraq in 2008 after he broke his femur while on duty in Fallujah, trying to make sense of what was going on in his home country while dealing with the trauma of war.
"He felt like he was spinning his wheels, trying to figure out what he would make of his life and what he should do next," his attorneys wrote. "At this point, he was only 20 years old."
He enrolled at Henry Ford Community College (HFCC) until 2010, when he was expelled because he was combative and disruptive, according to a government sentencing memorandum.
In 2011, at age 22, after preaching and proselytizing Salafi-jihadi beliefs — a radical Sunni Islamist ideology — to students on the Henry Ford Community College campus and online, he was banned by the school for being disruptive, according to a government sentencing memorandum and a letter from the vice president of student affairs.
He initially refused to leave, but left after campus police threatened to call Dearborn police.
The radicalization seemed to accelerate with the Arab Spring, which ran from around 2011 to 2012 and involved pro-democracy and anti-government protests around the Arab world, according to authorities.
From 2011 to 2013, federal authorities say Naser operated a YouTube channel that included the description: "Jihad for the sake of Allah is all i want in this life. And if I get Martyrdom i'll ask Allah if I can go Back and do it Again."
In 2012, he delivered pizzas for a few months. Then, for a brief time, he worked at a Mobil gas station in Bloomfield Township and a Sunoco gas station in Detroit, but was fired from both jobs on suspicion of stealing.
Travels to Iraq
Meanwhile, he developed a close relationship with a man named Russell Dennison, an aspiring radical Islamic preacher from Tampa, Fla., and the two jointly traveled to Iraq in early 2012. Authorities believe Russell was killed in 2019 while fighting for ISIS in Syria.
In August 2012, Naser returned to Michigan while Dennison traveled to Syria and joined the Al-Nusrah Front, an Islamic State of Iraq-affiliate group that was a precursor to ISIS, the U.S. Attorney's Office said.
After returning to the U.S., Naser started preparing to join Dennison.
He consumed volumes of terrorist propaganda material, researched weapons, and watched gruesome videos depicting acts of violence such as beheadings, authorities said.
Naser and Dennison continued to communicate and discussed travel routes through Lebanon and Turkey and the terror group’s urgent need for money to buy firearms. Naser twice attempted to leave the United States.
In November 2012, Naser booked a flight to Iraq at Detroit Metropolitan Airport and had luggage that contained a rifle scope, cane sword, and a four-inch tactical knife. He was barred from boarding the plane.
In January 2013, he vandalized and robbed the Bloomfield Township gas station where he had been fired and pepper-sprayed the clerk.
After the robbery, Naser took a Greyhound bus to Chicago and attempted to board a flight to Lebanon with $2,000 in cash, but was again denied boarding and returned to Michigan.
Naser was later convicted in the armed robbery and sentenced to 3 to 20 years. He served three years and was paroled in 2016.
While on parole, he renewed his oath to ISIS and focused his attention on how to support the group. He surreptitiously created social media accounts and joined invitation-only ISIS supporters’ chatrooms, groups, and private rooms where he obtained and viewed official ISIS media reports, publications, and other jihadi propaganda, federal authorities said in court papers.
"He voraciously consumed ISIS and other jihadi propaganda depicting and promoting violent extremism, and he collaborated with ISIS supporters and bombmakers," federal prosecutors wrote in an October 2024 court document.
Caught DEA Agent's Attention
In April 2017, he came to the attention of law enforcement in California after an undercover DEA agent noticed a man, later identified as Naser, making statements in an ISIS supporters chatroom, bragging about his real-world support for ISIS and encouraging others to do the same. Naser also bragged about his role in the murder and robbery of a Christian gold shop owner in Mosul, Iraq, in 2012 and giving the gold to Mujahedeen, radical Muslim guerrilla fighters.
On April 15, 2017, in a private chat for ISIS supporters, Naser asked a participant in Arabic if he knew how to build an explosive. On that same day, he downloaded a video instructing viewers how to build an explosive.
In August 2017, parole agents learned that Naser had lied to them in violation of his parole conditions when he claimed he did not have any social media accounts and had only one phone.
When his parole agent examined the secret phone, he immediately recognized ISIS propaganda images and videos and numerous social media accounts on Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, Skype, Twitter, PalTalk, Telegram, WhatsApp, and YouTube, a court document said.
Naser's marriage was crumbling, and he had his wife and three children move out of the home. He moved into the basement, invested in the home, and rented the upstairs to two tenants, according to court documents.
His attorneys, through their sentencing memorandum, tried to portray a gentler, caring side.
"One of his tenants had been previously homeless, so did not have a bed or bedframe; nor did he have a car," the attorneys wrote. "Aws took the tenant to buy a mattress and bedframe and assembled it for him."
Renting out the home helped him financially.
Aws also started online dating, setting up a Tinder profile and, according to one of his tenants, went on at least one date to a Red Wings game, his lawyers wrote.
"He read books on love and relationships, and spent more time with his family, helping his mother and brothers around his mother’s house. He played with drones in his backyard and at the park with his children. He was a good neighbor and became a responsible landlord."
On Oct. 30, 2017, the FBI searched Naser’s basement and found a computer, weapons, drones, and key ingredients for a bomb, including sulfuric acid, acetone, hydrogen peroxide, cyanuric acid, and calcium hypochlorite.
He also had mini light bulbs, like Christmas tree lights, which are commonly used by bombmakers as initiators in the fusing system. Additionally, he had switches, digital timers, and two-way radios, which can also be used as arming or firing switches and power sources in the fusing system, a government document said.
Dozens of Parole Violations
He was arrested and charged with 50 parole violations during the 18 months on parole, including slashing tires, assaultive, abusive, threatening, and intimidating conduct, lying to his parole agent, and possessing a BB gun and knives.
Specifically, one allegation was that in January 2017, Naser choked his wife and threatened to kill her and their daughter. Naser tried to get her to recant her story, according to a court document.
In a phone conversation recorded while he was in custody, his partner said to him: "You beat the crap out of me the same day, or the second day you found out that I was pregnant? Yeah, remember? Yeah, you don’t remember Aws, alright. And remember how you wanted to drag me to that room and kill me? Remember?”
In November 2017, his wife dissolved her union with Naser through an Islamic divorce.
Naser was convicted of parole violations and sentenced in 2018 to five years in prison.
After his arrest in late 2017 until 2022, he had 31 misconduct violations in state prison for fighting and violating other rules, the government said.
After he was arraigned in 2022 on his federal indictment for attempting to assist ISIS, he remained in custody, this time at the Federal Correctional Institution in Milan, outside of Ann Arbor. The government subsequently filed superseding indictments, amending the original charging papers.
In 2025, he was convicted by a federal jury in Detroit on the ISIS-related charges.
Federal prosecutors Saima S. Mohsin and Hank Moon pushed hard for a sentence of 35 years in prison, writing in a sentencing memorandum filed on April 30:
"Naser’s ongoing support for ISIS and its goals, his loathing for the United States, and his violent criminal history, combined with his disregard for the rule of law and repeated failure to follow rules in prison and on parole, present a clear threat to the public."
Naser's attorneys, James R. Gerometta and Amanda Bashi, in their own sentencing memorandum, asked for a 10-year sentence and pointed to their client's work with interventionist Mubin Shaikh from Parents 4 Peace (P4P), a non-profit deradicalization organization, who wrote:
"Mr. Naser currently presents as relatively moderate in his religious and political views, explicitly rejecting extremism and terrorism. He has demonstrated insight into the reputational and theological harm caused by violence committed in the name of religion and does not articulate ideological justification for violence against the government or the public.
"From a risk perspective, Mr. Naser does not presently exhibit indicators of ideological mobilization, grievance-fueled radicalization, or violent intent. He remains responsive to structured dialogue and demonstrates social cognition and reflective capacity consistent with low ideological risk."
Naser's brother Fady Naser also pleaded for understanding in a letter to the judge before sentencing.
"Throughout his life, Aws has faced many challenges and struggled with feeling disconnected from others," he wrote. "Yet even in his most difficult moments, he has never expressed the kind of hatred or intent to harm that these charges suggest. We worry that misunderstood interests, youthful naivety, or past mistakes have been used to paint a version of him that simply isn't true."
Last Thursday, U.S. District Judge Jonathan J.C. Grey sentenced Naser to 20 years.
After sentencing, Jennifer Runyan, head of the Detroit FBI, said in a statement:
"Thanks to the thorough investigative work of our FBI Detroit Joint Terrorism Task Force and partner agencies, this defendant was identified, disrupted and brought to justice.”
