CST intelligence leads to arrest of men in New York over ‘threat to Jewish community’

The Community Security Trust assisted police in New York with information leading to the arrest of two armed men who constituted a “developing threat to the Jewish community”, Jewish News can reveal.

The CST said it had found a string of tweets threatening to imminently attack a synagogue and other targets on Friday, and that their initial investigation suggested it came from the East Coast, leading the group to share it with New York Police Department.

A few hours later, two officers from the Metropolitan Transit Authority apprehended two suspects at Penn Station in Manhattan, one of them carrying an 8-inch hunting knife.

Their investigation into the two suspects found an illegal Glock 17 handgun, a 30-round magazine, a Nazi armband and a ski mask.

The suspects, Christopher Brown, 21, and Matthew Mahrer, 22, were formally arrested on Saturday, charged with making terrorist threats and criminal possession of a weapon.

“Much of the work that CST does to protect the Jewish community goes on behind the scenes, and this case gives a flavour of the expert research and investigations that underpin all our security work,” Mark Gardner, CST Chief Exec said.

“We are thankful that on this occasion we were able to share this information in real time with our partners in the United States and help to prevent what could potentially have been a serious attack on the Jewish community there.”

New York Times quoted Alvin Bragg, the Manhattan district attorney, saying that a “potential tragedy was averted when they were intercepted by police officers at Penn Station given that online postings indicated an intent to use these weapons at a Manhattan synagogue.”