Kevin James

Kevin James

It all started with a mobile phone, dropped at a petrol station robbery in Torrance, California, in July 2005.

"Through the phone we came up with a name, a residence and the location of the suspects," says Torrance police officer Dave Crespin.

"We arrested the suspects and conducted a search warrant on an apartment in South Los Angeles."

There had been a string of robberies in the area, mostly with the same MO; a getaway driver and another with a shotgun. But once on the premises detectives realised this was far bigger than a robbery and contacted the FBI.

The apartment, rented by suspects Levar Hanley Washington, a prison parolee, and Gregory Patterson, who had no criminal record, contained a trove of incriminating material that allegedly suggested the hapless robbers aspired to become terrorists.

Among material used to charge the men and two accomplices was a handwritten document called "Blueprint 2005", which cited eight tasks, such as obtaining silencers for pistols and bombs that can be activated from a distance.

Another document, "Modes of Attack", listed local targets.

The investigation led to California's New Folsom Prison and the cell of Kevin Lamar James, where investigators found the draft of a sinister press release.

Titled "Notoriety Moves", it outlined violent jihad in Southern California, and was allegedly due to be disseminated after the attacks began.

"This incident is the first in a series of incidents to come in a plight to defend and propagate traditional Islam in its purity," it read. "Sincere Muslims" were advised to avoid targets, including Jewish and non-Jewish supporters of an Israeli state.

Possible targets included a military recruitment office and National Guard facilities, synagogues, the Israeli consulate, the El Al desk at Los Angeles International Airport, and a mysterious "Campsite of Zion".

"Their plans were to enter either a recruiting facility or a synagogue and shoot as many people as possible before fleeing," says US attorney Gregory Staples, who helped to prosecute the case.

Last week James, 30, and Washington, 29, pleaded guilty in a Californian court to conspiring "to wage war against the Government of the United States through terrorism".