AUSTIN, Texas — With an immigrant terrorism scare far from the U.S.-Mexico border, North Carolina now officially joins the no longer very exclusive “every-state-is-a-border state” club.
An immigrant reportedly from Yemen or an area near Yemen appeared in North Carolina’s rural northwest Gates County began firing a rifle outside a Carolina Quick Stop store in the small town of Eure, then attacked responding Gates County Sheriff’s deputies and barricaded himself in a four-hour standoff with them. After the eventual arrest on assault and weapons charges, Sheriff Ray Campbell reported that Awet Hagos of Yemen was on the FBI’s terrorism watch list and that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) wanted him on an arrest warrant “detainer.”
Only after all this did ICE run fingerprints and find that Hagos was on the terror watch list and had somehow made his way to Haiti and, from there, the United States. He’d been living in the area for six months, the sheriff later told local news, apparently sponsored by the Quick Stop store owner.
I have been unable to independently confirm that Hagos is watch-listed, and the name Hagos is commonly associated with nationals in Eritrea and Ethiopia, although populations of both countries do also reside in Yemen.
This entire circumstance demands a public inquiry and far more national attention.
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