By Allan Lengel

A federal grand jury in Houston on Thursday indicted a 29-year-old Texas man on charges of attempting to provide material support to al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.

Barry Walter Bujol Jr. of Hempstead, Tex., was charged with attempting to provide al Qaeda with money,pre-paid telephone calling cards, mobile telephone SIM cards, global positioning system receivers, public access-restricted U.S. military publications, including one involving unmanned aerial vehicle operations and another involving the effects of U.S. military weapon systems in operations in Afghanistan, the Houston U.S. Attorney’s Office said.

The material had been provided to him by a confidential FBI informant.

By Allan Lengel

WASHINGTON — A 64-year-old information technology program manager for the FBI in suburban Washington pleaded guilty Wednesday to possession of child pornography, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said.

Samuel I. Kaplan, of Gainesville, Va., pled guilty in U.S. District Court in Alexandria, Va. He worked out of the FBI’s Chantilly office in Virginia.

Sentencing is set for Aug. 27. He faces up to 10 years in prison.

Authorities said court records showed that Kaplan used “the FBI’s network to facilitate sexually explicit communications.”

Authorities said investigators from the Justice Department’s Office of the Inspector General found between 10 to 20 images on his home computer of minors engaged in sexually explicit conduct.

Valerie Parlave/fbi photo

WASHINGTON — Valerie Parlave, who most recently served as acting special agent in charge of the FBI’s Washington field office’s Criminal Division, has been named special agent in charge of the FBI’s Little Rock Division, the agency announced Thursday.

Parlave joined the FBI in 1991 and was first assigned to the Las Vegas Division, where she worked as a case agent on violent crime and fugitive investigations.

She was later assigned to the division’s violent gang and drug squad. In 2000, she was promoted to supervisory special agent in the Criminal Investigative Division at FBI Headquarters.

Hussein Said he Wanted Iran to Think He Had Weapons of Mass Destruction

By Allan Lengel

Oye Vay.

Federal authorities in New York  are alleging that Jonathan Braun, 27, ran an international pot smuggling operation and associated with the Hells Angels while living at home with his Orthodox Jewish parents in Staten Island, the New York Daily News reported.

His bond hearing is set for Thursday in U.S. District Court in Brooklyn.

Authorities allege that he smuggled 100,000 kilos of marijuana across the Canadian border.

“He’s the real deal,” a law enforcement source told the Daily News. “He’s huge.”

The Daily News reports that Braun allegedly used “a small army of boatmen and drivers who used vehicles with hidden compartments to transport pot from Canada through the Akwesasne Native American reservations to New York, court papers say.”

Authorities allege that proceeds from street level dealers went to Braun’s Canadian bosses, and that he headed up the organization’s U.S. operation, the Daily News reported.

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Faisal Shahzad

The legal fate of Faisal Shahzad, the confessed Times Square car bomb plotter, remained unclear this week.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Theodore H. Katz in Manhattan postponed a preliminary hearing that had been set for earlier this week on Tuesday, the deadline for the government to file an indictment or possibly go for a criminal information, which is normally issued when a defendant plans to plead guilty, court records show.

The judge granted a 20-day continuance on the case, which the prosecution had requested and the defense agreed to , according to the New York Times. Under that arrangement, Shahzad waived his right to be charged in an indictment or information for the time being.

Christian Militia Hutaree patch/from website

Gun charges have been added to four members of the Hutaree, a Michigan-based Christian militia, which is accused of plotting to kill police officers and cause a revolt against the government, the Detroit Free Press reported.

A federal grand jury added the charges Wednesday.. The charges include possession of a machine gun and a sawed off shotgun.

Some of the group members have been freed on bond pending trial

The federal judge in the case had previously expressed some skepticism about the strength of case.