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A handwritten note found in the pocket of one of the two assailants who were shot dead by police led investigators to Ahmed A-Hady, a 36-year-old ex-con.
It contained a telephone number ending in 4115 and the address of the pawn shop, they said.
A-Hady had been convicted in 2012 of trying to obtain prescription drugs by fraud, which prohibited him from possessing a firearm, records show.
A search of his Keyport shop turned up three AR-15-style assault rifles and a .45-caliber handgun, among 13 weapons in a safe, authorities said at the time.
One of the weapons was a Sig Sauer .22 caliber rifle “capable of accepting a large-capacity magazine” that A-Hady had bought in Florida five months after his conviction, U.S. Attorney for New Jersey Rachel A. Honig said Tuesday.
Investigators also found more than 400 rounds of ammunition, including a “large number of hollow-point bullets” in A-Hady’s apartment above the store, she said.
A-Hady took a deal from the government rather than go to trial, pleading guilty to one count of possession of a firearm by a convicted felon.
In addition to the prison term, U.S. District Court Katharine S. Hayden sentenced A-Hady to three years of supervised release during a videoconference from Newark.
A-Hady also “forfeited his interest, if any, in the firearms recovered during the search of the pawnshop,” Honig noted.
Honig credited special agents of the FBI, the ATF, the New Jersey Attorney General’s Office and officers with the Joint Terrorism Task Force, along with New Jersey State Police, for the investigation leading to the weapons discovery and A-Hady’s arrest.
She also thanked the Hudson County Prosecutor’s Office and Jersey City police for their assistance.
Securing the plea and sentence were Ronnell Wilson, chief of Honig’s National Security Unit, and unit Assistant U.S. Attorneys Dean C. Sovolos and Thomas S. Kearney.
THE JERSEY CITY SHOOTINGS:
David Anderson and Francine Graham had slain Jersey City Police Officer Joseph Seals in a Bayview Cemetery and wounded another officer before killing three civilians at the JC Kosher Supermarket on Martin Luther King Drive in the Greenville section on Dec. 10, 2019.
An intense exchange followed between police and Anderson and Graham, who were holed up in the store.
An officer who'd taken cover across the street and three officers on the third floor of the Sacred Heart School fired key shots, law enforcement sources said.
A little less than three hours after the standoff began, a Bearcat driven by Jersey City Police Officer Jimmy Frattini rammed the building and flash bombs were ignited.
Jersey City Detectives Joziph Soliman and John Antman and Newark Police Detective Joseph Kerik emerged from the vehicle and found the bodies of Anderson and Graham, along with three dead civilians.
They were identified as Mindy Ferencz, 32, Miguel Douglas, 49, and Moshe Deutsch, 24. A fourth person escaped the store unharmed.
An explosive device was found in the rental van that had the capacity to kill or maim people up to 500 yards away -- along with enough material for a second bomb.
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