Hemant Lakhani
From CNN, :
A British man accused of trying to smuggle shoulder-held missiles into the United States and offering to obtain a radioactive “dirty bomb” for terrorists will stand trial November 3.
Hemant Lakhani, who appeared in U.S. District Court in Newark, N.J., has been in custody since his arrest last August. …
Lakhani, 68, of the Hendon area of London, was arrested in a sting operation involving an 18-month collaboration among officials in the United States, Russia and Britain.
The indictment against Lakhani claims the Indian-born Briton told an investigator that shoulder-fired surface-to-air missiles he attempted to import into the United States “could be used most effectively in terrorist attacks against commercial aircraft in the United States if 10 to 15 commercial aircraft were shot down simultaneously at different locations throughout the country.”
According to federal prosecutors, he boasted of sales to terrorist groups and thought he had struck a deal to sell a missile to a Somali group seeking to launch a “jihad” against a U.S. commercial airline.
He tried to sell the group 200 missiles, and later insisted they buy 50 after they received the first one, priced at $85,000.
The man claiming to represent the Somali group was instead a cooperating witness for the United States, the missile Lakhani brought into the country was a dud, and the undercover Russian authorities who sold him the missile were collaborating with U.S. officials in the sting.
Prosecutors brought further charges against Lakhani in December, claiming he offered to procure a variety of anti-aircraft weapons, tanks and radar systems, as well as a radioactive explosive device known as a “dirty bomb.”