He was definitely in for more than he was expecting. What he found out was shocking and ended up saving countless lives – and goes to show just how serious domestic threats are.
An NYPD officer pretended to be a Brooklyn College student at the Islamic Society in New York City, and taking the Muslim oath of faith, before befriending Muslim students to infiltrate the community.
The woman, who went by the name of Mel, short for Melike, spent four years earning the trust of Islamic students at the college as part of an NYPD operation to spy on Muslims, according to NY’s daily weblog Gothamist.
The controversial mission was part of the police departments well-documented plan that sees the blanket surveillance of innocent Muslims.
The Mayor of New York, Bill deBlasio has openly criticized such surveillance and declared at a Ramadan dinner that Muslim New Yorkers were ‘still fighting for basic human rights.’
‘We recently shut down the Demographics Unit at NYPD, which conducted surveillance on Muslim New Yorkers. Because it’s unfair to single out people on the sole basis of their religion,’ he added.
The undercover operation led to some important arrests. Four years after Mel had infiltrated the college, two Queens residents, Noelle Velentzas and Asia Siddiqui, were arrested and charged with allegedly planning to build a bomb.
The US Justice Department issued a release stating that the women were linked to members of al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula and the Islamic State.
Read more: Daily Mail
