A Virginia man who was convicted of sending at least $185,000 to the Islamic State’s coffers as the terrorist organization struggled to rebuild its depleted operations in Syria was sentenced Wednesday to more than 30 years in prison after a heated exchange with a federal judge.
An attorney for Mohammed Azharuddin Chhipa, 35, started off by describing him as a lonely and despondent man who was “longing for belonging” and took on a “blusterous” online persona.
“Mr. Chhipa is figuring out that he needs help,” defense attorney Zachary Deubler told U.S. District Judge David J. Novak, requesting a prison term of eight years at most. “We’re seeing the page turn here, your honor.”
The hearing veered off the rails once it was Chhipa’s turn to speak.
Chhipa, who a prosecutor said “transmitted a huge amount of money to ISIS” after the FBI let him off with a warning in 2019, immediately denounced the government as “evil and oppressive.” He described his wife, Allison Fluke-Ekren, as another victim of injustice. She pleaded guilty in a separate case and is serving two decades in prison for leading an all-female Islamic State battalion that trained women and girls to use rifles and suicide vests.
Reading from prepared remarks, Chhipa complained that neither he nor his wife was allowed to speak to her children.
“All right, hold on a second. This is nonsense,” Novak said, admonishing Chhipa to focus on his case. “Why don’t you talk about the crime?”
“I didn’t commit any crime,” Chhipa replied. He continued criticizing the government as “evil,” “hypocritical,” “tyrannical” and “unjust,” until the judge cut him off again.
“This is not a forum for you to complain about the United States of America,” Novak said, noting that Chhipa had been granted U.S. citizenship after immigrating with his family at age 4 from India.
The judge sentenced Chhipa to 30 years and four months in prison, describing him as a “key middleman” who rounded up funds from Islamic State supporters in the United States and sent the money overseas, destined for male Islamic State fighters and women trying to break out of the al-Hol refugee camp in Syria, which the FBI assessed to be a “stronghold of ISIS ideology.”
The hearing concluded on an acrimonious note, as two of Chhipa’s brothers, who had been sitting in the courtroom gallery for the proceedings, refused to stand for the judge as he exited the courtroom. Novak told the deputy U.S. marshals not to press the issue because Chhipa’s family had registered a “religious objection” to the practice during his trial last year.
A chaotic scene then unfolded in the lobby of the Alexandria, Virginia, federal courthouse as a group of marshals escorted the two brothers, Irfan and Mohsin Chhipa, to the first-floor exit. Mohsin Chhipa exited the building, while Irfan Chhipa remained inside by the glass doors, held by the arms and surrounded by a group of court security staff members. The marshals then took down Irfan Chhipa and piled on him as more security officers rushed into the lobby. He was arrested on the spot and taken to a holding area.
It was not immediately clear what precipitated the use of force and arrest. A spokesman for the U.S. attorney’s office in Alexandria declined to comment.
Mohsin Chhipa said afterward that he had “no idea” why his brother was arrested. He said they wanted information from the clerk’s office after the sentencing but were told to leave the building.
“My brother was telling him: ‘Why are you shoving us? We’re leaving. We’re leaving,’” Mohsin Chhipa said.
Outside the courthouse, a court security officer could be heard telling Mohsin Chhipa: “Your brother did something that the deputy marshal felt he had to respond to. … The problem is you guys have a history of being disrespectful.”
“Do not come back to the courthouse,” the officer said. Mohsin Chhipa later returned and got more information about Irfan Chhipa from the same officer.
Islamic State forces came to dominate parts of Syria beginning around 2014 and ending by 2018, committing atrocities and beheading journalists and humanitarian aid workers as part of a tech-savvy propaganda and recruitment campaign with global reach. The FBI began monitoring Chhipa in 2008 and closed its counterterrorism probe in 2018 without seeking criminal charges, then reopened its investigation after an agent in Miami noticed an account that was later linked to Chhipa was posting pro-Islamic State commentary on Facebook. The FBI executed a search warrant at his Fairfax County, Virginia, home in 2019 and found a trove of terrorist propaganda materials, according to court records.
“In August of 2019, the FBI sat him down and warned him that the money he was sending overseas was supporting terrorism. Nevertheless, he persisted,” prosecutors wrote in a sentencing filing. Assistant U.S. Attorney Anthony T. Aminoff said at Wednesday’s hearing that investigators had given Chhipa “a golden opportunity to quit … and he laughed at them.”
After the FBI raided his home, prosecutors said, Chhipa fled to Mexico, with plans to head to the Middle East, concerned that he might be arrested for sending $12,300 to a woman in the Philippines who was caught with Islamic State flags and bombmaking materials. But he was intercepted by foreign authorities and sent back to Virginia, prosecutors said. It was then that Chhipa began his career as one of the Islamic State’s most prolific fundraisers, Aminoff said, contributing his own money and driving around the country to secure funds from other supporters by hand, often working closely with a female Islamic State member called Umm Dujana.
“He was the one dispensing advice, creating fake phone numbers and Telegram accounts, traveling hundreds of miles to make cash pickups, and doing all the things necessary for this scheme to flourish,” the Justice Department said in a legal filing. The British-born Dujana would ensure the funds got to their final destination, according to the trial evidence.
Deubler and defense attorney Jessica Carmichael argued throughout the legal proceedings that much of Chhipa’s incriminating conduct was carried out at the behest of people he thought were Islamic State supporters but were actually undercover FBI agents. They argued he was sending funds to the Middle East “for humanitarian work – oftentimes at the explicit direction of the FBI.” The attorneys declined to comment Wednesday.