Woman faces US terror plot charges
US federal prosecutors have filed terrorism charges against a second American woman in the so-called "Jihad Jane" case, accusing the pair of plotting online to attend a terror training camp.
Jamie Paulin-Ramirez flew from Ireland to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, where she was arrested by agents with the joint terrorism task force there.
Last month, authorities in Ireland detained Paulin-Ramirez and six others as they investigated an alleged plot to kill a Swedish cartoonist whose drawing had offended many Muslims.
Those seven suspects in Ireland were linked to Colleen LaRose, a 46-year-old woman who had travelled to Europe but was arrested last autumn when she returned to the United States.
The new indictment charges that LaRose, 46, and Paulin-Ramirez, 31, separately travelled to Europe to support violent holy war.
The court papers also say that once LaRose was in Europe, she invited Paulin-Ramirez to join her to attend a "training camp".
Paulin-Ramirez, prosecutors charge, accepted the invitation and asked to bring her six-year-old son with her. She and the boy travelled to Europe last September and on the day of her arrival, she married a co-conspirator whom she had known only from online discussions, authorities said.
When the initial charges were unsealed last month against LaRose, 46, it marked one of only a handful of times the United States has filed terrorism charges against a woman.
LaRose has pleaded not guilty in the case.
LaRose apparently spent long hours online in recent years while caring for her boyfriend's elderly father in a small eastern Pennsylvania town. The congressman who represents the district said she had co-operated with authorities after her arrest late last year, which went unannounced until the seven suspects in Ireland were detained in March.