Former Rochester pizza shop owner imprisoned for ISIS recruiting now accused of attempted murder

Mufid Elfgeeh, the former Rochester pizza shop owner imprisoned for recruiting for ISIS, is now accused of attempted murder at a federal prison in Kentucky.

Elfgeeh, 39, was indicted last week in Kentucky on a federal charge of attempted murder. The indictment provides no more information, except identifying the victim by the initials of A.J.W.

The alleged murder attempt happened in January at the McCreary federal prison in Kentucky, a high-security prison where Elfgeeh was then housed. He is now imprisoned at a federal prison in Pennsylvania, according to federal Bureau of Prisons records.

Elfgeeh pleaded guilty in 2015 federal court in Rochester to recruiting for the Islamic State terrorist organization, or ISIS. He agreed to a sentence of 22½ years. His scheduled release date was 2034.

Elfgeeh was one of the first in the United States to be found guilty of ISIS recruitment.

A naturalized citizen from Yemen, Elfgeeh admitted that he worked with two local would-be recruits to travel to Syria and join ISIS as it fought to establish a caliphate in the Middle East. He also shipped money to a Yemeni recruit, who ultimately did not travel to Syria.

The owner of a Rochester pizza shop on North Clinton Avenue, Elfgeeh came to the attention of the FBI in late 2013. Two FBI informants met with Elfgeeh about traveling to Syria and buying handguns.

Rochester's Joint Terrorism Task Force, a combination of FBI agents and local police, arrested Elfgeeh in May 2014, in the Hudson Avenue Walmart parking lot as he met an informant to pick up the guns. Elfgeeh allegedly wanted to use the guns to kill returning American troops, but he did not admit to those plans in his plea.

This article originally appeared on Rochester Democrat and Chronicle: Mufid Elfgeeh accused of attempted murder in federal prison