Jonathan Hunter Kramer, 21, of Valencia, knowingly received a semiautomatic rifle and rifle ammunition on Saturday, Sept. 12, knowing they would be used to commit a felony or federal terrorism crime, including supporting ISIS, a federal grand jury in Pittsburgh charged.
Kramer remains detained pending trial. The one-count indictment carries a maximum sentence of 15 years in prison, a $250,000 fine, or both.
The case is the latest high-profile federal threat prosecution tied to Butler County, where Thomas Matthew Crooks opened fire at President Donald Trump’s July 2024 campaign rally. The cases are not connected.
Crooks killed firefighter Corey Comperatore and injured others at the Butler Farm Show grounds before he was killed by a Secret Service counter-sniper. Crooks lived in Bethel Park, Allegheny County.
Butler resident Shawn Monper was also charged federally this year after authorities said he made online threats against Trump and other officials. That case is not connected to Kramer’s, either.
The Justice Department said Kramer had been using the online persona “Hamza Al Rashid,” which claimed affiliation with ISIS, offered to share explosive manuals, and said just days before Sept. 12 that its “mission” was ready but it was missing a “weapon.”
Daily Voice obtained the original criminal complaint in September.
The FBI had known Kramer since an earlier 2023 investigation, when he was a minor. That case resulted in him being charged and adjudicated delinquent by Pennsylvania authorities for his role in a plot to commit a mass-casualty incident and for possessing child sexual abuse material, according to court records.
The affidavit says the earlier FBI investigation began with an online tip about threats connected to a Telegram account. Agents identified Kramer as the user, obtained warrants, and searched his Valencia home in April 2023.
During that search, agents said they found a recording in which Kramer pledged allegiance to the former ISIS leader. He was sent to a juvenile treatment center in Oil City following his Pennsylvania adjudication, according to the complaint.
Kramer was released in March. Days later, an anonymous person reported to the FBI that he had returned to troubling behavior, including ordering “mysterious” packages and speaking with “friends from before” his juvenile adjudication, the Justice Department said.
Investigators said they tied several Reddit accounts to Kramer through his email address, phone number, internet records, and prior device evidence. The accounts included “u/i_love_femboys6969” and “u/ILoveGayRobloxPorn,” according to the affidavit. Investigators cited posts from the wider group of accounts that included ISIS-related propaganda and violent imagery.
Agents later linked Kramer to the encrypted-messaging account “Hamza Al Rashid,” according to the affidavit. An FBI confidential human source communicated with that account, which discussed obtaining firearms and attacking crowds, investigators wrote.
On Sept. 12, FBI agents watched Kramer quickly leave his Valencia home carrying a bag. He took an Uber to a Walmart in Gibsonia, bought a disposable cellphone, and met someone in the parking lot, court records state.
Surveillance footage appeared to show Kramer receiving a long black bag from the trunk of another vehicle. Federal prosecutors said he later booked a room at the Cranberry Park Hotel, paid cash, and visited the gun counter at Dunham’s Sports.
FBI agents stopped Kramer as he returned to the hotel carrying three 30-round rifle magazines and five boxes of rifle ammunition, prosecutors said.
Search warrants executed on Kramer, his hotel room, and his home turned up a DPMS Panther Arms semiautomatic rifle, five rifle magazines — two loaded — a rifle bipod and scope, 190 rounds of ammunition, pepper spray, Faraday bags designed to block electronic signals, and other items, according to the Justice Department.
Agents also found about 30 knives and a handwritten note at his family’s home that read: “DoNt look For me[.] IDK what I did buT I cant live In constant Fear[.]”
Assistant U.S. Attorneys Brendan J. McKenna and Alyssa R. Angotti, along with Justice Department National Security Division trial attorneys Andrew Briggs and Matthew Hracho, are prosecuting the case.
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