Demetrius Pitts accused in Cleveland bomb plot after FBI sting

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An Ohio man was charged Monday with plotting a terrorist attack in Cleveland on July 4 after an FBI infiltration operation, which gave him a bus pass. Demetrius Pitts, 48, told an undercover FBI employee pretending to be an Al Qaeda sympathizer, according to a complaint from the federal government. "I'm going to be somewhere because I want to see him explode."

Nothing indicates that Pitts could have led an attack by himself. The criminal complaint suggests that he considered his role of planning and monitoring and did not want to be involved in obtaining or building explosives.

According to court records, the FBI began to interest Pitts in 2015 when he sent a disturbing message to a local. A television report with a Facebook account registered under his alias, Abdur Raheem Rahfeeq.

After more alarming comments on Facebook in 2017, the FBI took a closer look and determined that Pitts was interested in joining Al Qaeda. Demetrius Pitts "/>

A Secret FBI employee met with Pitts and began recording their conversations , in which he dreamed of beheading President Donald Trump, attacking American soldiers and spreading terror in Cleveland on Independence Day.

"I'm trying to understand Something that would shake them on July 4th, "he said in a recording

An FBI informant provided Pitts with a pass so he could travel to downtown Cleveland to take pictures of the targets He allegedly swore allegiance to terrorist leaders in videos made with a mobile phone – which was also provided by the FBI.His access code for the phone was not exactly a surprise: 0704, the date of the supposed attack.

Pitts would also have said that he was interested in doing reconnaissance in Philadelphia, where he had lived. "Pitts said that it was his" work "of" go to see the base of the ground ", and that it was up to other" brothers "to complete the other parts of the work," says the complaint.

I do not want to meet all the Brothers, "he said at one point to the secret FBI employee

" And the detonator guy? asked the FBI employee.

"Now I do not even want to meet him," said Pitts. "He has nothing to do with me."

"The only thing I will be responsible for, is to look at the place, to see the landscape," he added.

He seemed to try The patience of the FBI handler when he suggested at the last minute to move from explosive packaging to remote controlled cars and use a van

Authorities have arrested Pitts on Sunday and charged him with material support to a terrorist organization It was unclear whether he had gotten a lawyer and NBC News could not join any member of his family.

His Facebook pages, which have since been withdrawn, indicated his job as a chef. Trump and help the Taliban at different sites over the past two years.