NYC “wannabe playboy” on trial for trying to join Taliban and “kill Americans”

Delawar Mohammed Hossein, 36, a former New York City Uber driver faces terrorism charges over his alleged attempt to join the Taliban.

He was arrested at the JFK airport in 2019 while boarding a flight to Thailand, and had a mission to “kill Americans,” prosecutors alleged during the opening statements of his trial on Wednesday.

Prosecutors further allege that he wasn’t any ordinary traveler and had planned the mission to kill Americans for over a year.

He had $10,000 in cash and also ordered supplies needed to survive in rural Afghanistan where some Taliban groups were located at the time, according to Assistant US Attorney Ben Schrier.

Hossein’s defense has called him a “wannabe playboy,” who decided to leave his family and fly to Thailand to womanize.

The defense also highlighted him as a discouraged Uber driver, upset with his life and financial needs and wanted to abandon it all with Thai women.

According to the defense, Hossein’s bag was full of perfumes, lotions, designer shirts and jeans that he wanted to give to women.

The day he was arrested, Hossein had also asked an undercover FBI agent for extra condoms and other lubricants before he left for the airport, according to the defense counsel.

Prosecutors however, argue that this was all part of Hossein’s elaborate scheme to fool authorities into believing him to be a “wannabe playboy,” and that they have sufficient evidence to prove he intended to go to Afghanistan to “kill non-Muslim Americans.”

According to Assistant US Attorney Ben Schrier, Hossein was an avid reader of al-Qaeda literature that guided on the making of bombs and taught Jihad against non-believers.

Hossein had only stopped bombing a NYC military installation because he thought it wouldn’t kill many people, according to Schrier as reported by the Washington Post.

The prosecution also has an audio recording of Hossein in which he says he wants to kill Americans.

In response, the defense has called the suspect a Muslim man “with a wild imagination.”

Hossein faces multiple charges with attempting to provide material support for terrorism, and attempting to make contribution to a terrorist organization.

If convicted, he could face decades in prison.