'These kids are gamers.' Halloween terror suspect's lawyer said FBI 'jumped the gun' Tresa Baldas, USA TODAY NETWORK November 2, 2025 at 11:36 PM 0 A lawyer representing one of five young men arrested in an alleged Halloween terrorism plot says the suspects are merely video gamers who engaged in tough talk online and recreational gun activities — not radicalized terrorists, as the FBI has claimed. "These kids are gamers, gamers are weird in the way they talk to each other," attorney Amir Makled told the USA TODAY Network following a Nov. 1 jail visit with his client.
- - 'These kids are gamers.' Halloween terror suspect's lawyer said FBI 'jumped the gun'
Tresa Baldas, USA TODAY NETWORK November 2, 2025 at 11:36 PM
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A lawyer representing one of five young men arrested in an alleged Halloween terrorism plot says the suspects are merely video gamers who engaged in tough talk online and recreational gun activities — not radicalized terrorists, as the FBI has claimed.
"These kids are gamers, gamers are weird in the way they talk to each other," attorney Amir Makled told the USA TODAY Network following a Nov. 1 jail visit with his client.
Makled said his client is one of five men ages 16 to 20, all born in the United States, who were arrested in separate FBI raids on Halloween and accused of plotting to carry out a terrorist attack over the weekend
1 / 5FBI thwarts 'potential terrorist attack' in Michigan. See their searchMembers of the FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force search a home in Dearborn, Michigan, on October 31, 2025. FBI Director Kash Patel said Friday that the agency had thwarted a "potential terrorist attack" planned in the northern state of Michigan over Halloween weekend
More: Lawyer for terror plot suspect: 'There's nothing here'
FBI Director Kash Patel announced Oct. 31 that the agency had arrested multiple people and stopped a "potential act of terror" before it unfolded. He did not provide details on the plot. But Makled contested that description.
"There is nothing here," Makled claimed. "What they did was jump the gun."
As for his 20-year-old client, who remains jailed without charges, Makled said: "He says they got it all wrong. ... There's no plan. There was no plot, and there was no imminent threat of a terrorism event in the state of Michigan at all."
None of the five suspects have been charged. In federal cases, the government typically has 48 hours to charge someone before releasing them.
FBI officials haven't confirmed if the operations are connected to the thwarted terrorist attack plot announced by Director Kash Patel.
More: Terrorist plot thwarted in Michigan, FBI Director Kash Patel says: What we know
According to Makled, the five suspects landed on the FBI's radar over their recreational gun activity. The FBI was concerned about this activity and investigated it, he said. The suspects' internet activity also came under scrutiny, he said, noting the suspects were "going down the rabbit hole of different types of websites."
"It causes the government to pause and look into it, which is fine," Makled said. "That's police work. But don't use broad strokes and try to paint our kids from our community as terrorists because of that."
Makled maintains that the case is about protected free speech — friends talking tough on the internet — and that there was no plan to harm anyone.
The family also is hoping the U.S. Attorney's Office sees things the same way. A spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney's Office declined to comment Nov. 1, as did Jordan Hall, spokesperson for the Detroit FBI office.
When asked whether the FBI used undercover agents in this investigation, Makled said he didn't know.
The lawyer said this case reminds him of the failed 2012 Hutaree terrorism trial, which involved a group of heavily armed militia members upset with the government, and talking about committing all sorts of violence while "playing army" in the woods.
The defense in that case argued it was all talk. The judge eventually agreed and acquitted seven of the Hutaree defendants, just as the jury was about to go into deliberations. The defendants were free to go and the jury was sent home.
Contact Tresa Baldas: [email protected]
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Lawyer for Halloween terror plot suspect says FBI 'jumped the gun'
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Published: November 02, 2025 at 05:54PM on Source: ONEEL MAG
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