Mohamed Osman Mohamud

Mohamed Osman Mohamud (born 1991) is a Somali-American student who was arrested in an FBI sting operation on November 26, 2010 after attempting to set off what he thought was a terrorist bomb in Portland, Oregon. He was charged with attempting to use a weapon of mass destruction.
Background and incident
Mohamud was born in Somalia and grew up in Beaverton, OR. He is a naturalized US citizen. Mohamud graduated from Westview High School in Beaverton, Oregon. At the time of the incident, he was a resident of Corvallis, Oregon and was attending Oregon State University. Under the pen name Ibnul Mubarak, Mohamud had written for the English-language publication Jihad Recollections as part of his earlier attempts to be associated with violent jihad ideology. Several attempts to travel outside the US by air failed because he was on a no-fly list, but he did maintain contact with a former American student living in Pakistan.
Prior to his arrest, Mohamud had been monitored by the FBI for months, and an undercover FBI agent, posing as a terrorist, had been in contact with him since June 2010. In preparation for the bombing, Mohamud and undercover FBI operatives detonated a test bomb in Lincoln County, Oregon on November 4. The attempted bombing took place at Portland's Pioneer Courthouse Square at the corner of Southwest Yamhill Street and Sixth Avenue before the city's annual Christmas tree lighting. The fake bomb was in a white van that carried six 55-gallon drums with detonation cords and plastic caps. Mohamud tried to set it off by dialing a phone number. Because the bomb was actually a fake supplied by the FBI, the public was never in any danger. According to an affidavit, Mohamud told the agents, "I want whoever is attending that event to leave, to leave either dead or injured."
Analysis
Early analysis questioned whether entrapment by FBI operatives was involved. A columnist in The Oregonian asked, "How far would Mohamud have traveled down that road without the help of those very operatives?" Christopher Dickey of Newsweek said the FBI "took no chances with the court of public opinion," to make sure that Mohamud did not appear to be a victim of entrapment.
Mohamud had been told several times that his planned bomb could kill women and children, and that he could back out, but he told agents, "Since I was 15 I thought about all this... It's gonna be a fireworks show... a spectacular show."
Mohamud shouted "" after he was taken into custody.

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