Officials search home of Ashland terror plot suspect

ASHLAND, Mass. -- Police officers and federal agents searched the home of a 26-year-old Ashland man on Wednesday who was arrested and accused of plotting to destroy the Pentagon and the U.S. Capitol with large remote-controlled aircraft filled with explosives.

Rezwan Ferdaus lives at a two-story home at 22 Coburn Drive with his mother, father and brother, according to neighbors. They say his family has lived in the home for 13 years.

Neighbors said the two children are much older than the other children in the neighborhood, so many of the families didn’t know them very well.

“There was one that kind of got into a little trouble with the law, you know,” Trish Herzog, a neighbor, said of one of the sons. “Like vandalism, just teenage pranks kind of stuff.”

Neighbors watched investigators remove evidence from Ferdaus’ family’s home. They remember him as a teenager who got into some trouble at Ashland High School six or seven years ago, but they said they never thought he’d be accused of plotting an elaborate terrorist attack against his own country.

“I would not have ever thought this. It is still hard to believe,” said Herzog.

According to a 42-page affidavit, Ferdaus had two meetings at his family’s Ashland home this year. On Jan. 11, the government’s cooperating witness picked Ferdaus up at the Ashland home and he asked if the witness could, “obtain highly explosive powder.”

On March 2, Ferdaus again met at his home with the government witness and showed off the electrical components and remote controlled cars he built. Ferdaus said he’d fill them with either, “A particular home-made device or handheld [grenades].”

“It’s scary,” said Heather Tryon, a neighbor. “Walking my daughter and my dog, it’s scary. It’s scary.”

For families in the neighborhood, they say they’ve only know the parents to be good neighbors and nothing else.

“They must just be horrified right now. They just must be…I can’t imagine how [his mother] must feel, how they feel right now. The family must be really grief struck. They’re really not like that,” Herzog said.

Coburn Drive was lined with undercover vehicles and agents went in and out of the home on Wednesday. Neighbors said officials arrived at the home around 2 p.m.

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