WASHINGTON (AP) — A Department of Energy electrical engineer has been arrested for providing support to the Iran-backed Houthi rebelsincluding purchasing materials for homemade explosives and drones and traveling to Yemen, the Justice Department announced Thursday.
Ashton Hamed Ellaboudy, 51, of Richland, Washington, was arrested Thursday and is scheduled to make his first court appearance Friday. Court records do not list an attorney available to speak on his behalf.
The FBI says Ellaboudy aimed to help the Houthis improve their communications capabilities and last September traveled to Yemen, where the Houthis and Saudi-backed government forces are now engaged in operations. renewed violence which killed hundreds of people and displaced tens of thousands. The conflict began in 2014 when Iran-backed rebels took control of the capital, Sanaa, forcing the country’s government into exile in Saudi Arabia.
Upon returning to the United States, authorities said, Ellaboudy told Customs and Border Protection officials that he was returning from Oman on a work trip and was part of a U.S. government mission to inspect missile defense systems. But investigators questioned Ellaboudy’s supervisor, who said he had no knowledge of any international travel or Energy Department missile inspection program to which Ellaboudy was assigned, according to an FBI affidavit.
Ellaboudy himself was recorded telling FBI informants, whom officials brought into the investigation, that he had to smuggle himself in and out of Yemen and that he had hoped to reach the country’s capital to establish ties with the government, the affidavit said. He ultimately was unable to travel to Sanaa, the FBI said.
The FBI says investigators began looking into Ellaboudy after learning that he had purchased precursor chemicals commonly used in building homemade explosive devices, including acetone and sodium bisulfate, as well as parts used for drones.
During the investigation, according to the FBI, he communicated with several informants – including one who claimed to be a Houthi colonel – and provided advice and assistance regarding communications equipment.
Ellaboudy is charged under a law that makes it a crime to provide material support to a group designated by the United States as a foreign terrorist organization, which includes the Houthis.
“These allegations are so deeply disturbing that they almost defy imagination,” John Eisenberg, assistant attorney general for the Justice Department’s National Security Division, said in a statement.
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