JW Covers Emad Karakrah’s Arraignment in Chicago

Chicago, Ill.—One of the key players—Emad Karakrah—in a narco-terror ring that runs from El Paso to Chicago to New York City was arraigned today and Judicial Watch covered the hearing live in Cook County Court, Illinois.

Earlier this month JW reported that Karakrah was arrested in late August after leading police on a high-speed chase through Chicago streets as an Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) flag waved from his car.  When Chicago Police finally stopped and arrested Karakrah, he told officers his car was rigged with explosives that would detonate if searched.  Bomb disposal units secured the vehicle without incident, but Karakrah’s arrest helped expose a narco-terrorist network with roots and financing in El Paso.

At today’s court hearing in Chicago Karakrah appeared before Judge Evelyn B. Clay in courtroom 402 wearing a tan prison uniform with “2XL” on his chest. Karakrah’s hair was closely cropped and he had a beard and mustache. The prosecutor, Lauren Brown, told the judge that the state had not completed discovery and the judge set a status conference for October 29. The hearing lasted about two minutes and Karakrah, who is being represented by a public defender, was hauled back to Cook County jail.

Sources tell Judicial Watch that legal proceedings against Karakrah in Chicago were twice delayed because of FBI “equities.” Karakrah is, allegedly, a former FBI confidential informant who has gone rogue, breaking contact with his bureau handlers. He is a logistics and transportation operative for militant Islamists in the United States, according to sources close to the investigation. He moves people, weapons, explosives, drugs, money, and other materiel to terrorist cells operating in Chicago, Brooklyn, NY and Saddle Brook, NJ — among other locations across the United States.

More than a decade ago Karakrah smuggled drugs and weapons for the Juarez drug cartel in Mexico.  In July of this year, he was on a supply run to a militant Islamist cell operating out of a basement in Brooklyn, sources tell Judicial Watch. Before moving to Chicago sometime in 2011, Karakrah lived in Anthony, NM and a suburb of El Paso, TX.  His ex-wife and two children remain in the El Paso area.  In 1999 Karakrah pleaded guilty to felony “Criminal Sexual Penetration of a Child, Ages 13-16” as well as a related conspiracy charge, according to public records.  Law enforcement sources characterized Karakrah as a “dangerous, crazy thug.”

Karakrah’s business associate, an illegal alien named Hector Pedroza Huerta, recently got arrested for driving intoxicated and is being held in El Paso County Jail. During 2010/2011 Karakrah and Huerta met with two of the FBI’s “most wanted” terrorists: Jaber A. Elbaneh and Adnan Gulshair el Shukrijumah(a/k/a: “Javier Robles”). The meetings took place in a private home in Anthony, NM. The four men discussed the movement of drugs, money and people. The plots were further planned by fellow conspirators at a “mosque” on Redd Road in El Paso, as well as two other “mosques” in the city. Karakrah, Huerta, Elbaneh and el Shukrijumah all met again in Anthony, NM in March 2014 according to Judicial Watch sources.