Court documents show that less than two years after Muhammad Bailor Jalloh was released from prison for trying to help ISIS, They opened fire in a classroom at Old Dominion University in Virginia on Thursday before ROTC cadets were able to subdue and kill him.
The shooting, which killed one person and wounded two others, has raised questions about why Jalloh, who the FBI identified as the gunman, was imprisoned, and the terms of his release — with some elected officials questioning how someone with known ties to the Islamic State could carry out such an attack.
“The horrific tragedy that occurred today on the ODU campus should never have happened,” U.S. Rep. Gene Keegans, who represents the congressional district adjacent to the university, wrote on Facebook.
After Jalloh pleaded guilty in October 2016 to providing material support to a designated foreign terrorist organization — the Islamic State — a federal judge in 2017 sentenced him to 11 years in prison with time served retroactive to his arrest in July 2016.
Jalloh was released from federal custody on December 23, 2024. It was not immediately clear why his release from prison was delayed. Prisoners can take time off their sentence for a number of reasons, but it is not known whether this happened in this case.
He was under surveillance, which is similar to surveillance, when he carried out the attack on Thursday. Based on its release date, this will extend until 2029.
Jalloh’s October 2016 plea came after a three-month operation in which he, then 26, admitted to an undercover FBI agent that he was considering carrying out an attack similar to the 2009 shooting at Fort Hood, which left 13 people dead. Authorities launched the operation in 2016 after Jalloh made contact with ISIS members in Africa earlier that year.
Jalloh later told the informant that ISIS asked him if he wanted to participate in the attack. He tried to donate $500 to the group, but the money actually went to an account controlled by the FBI, according to court documents.
Jalloh then tried to purchase an AR-15 assault rifle from a gun store in Virginia, but his request was denied because he lacked the proper paperwork. He returned the next day and purchased a different assault rifle, the affidavit says. Prosecutors said the gun became inoperable before Jalloh left the store, without Jalloh’s knowledge. He was arrested the next day.
In 2017, the Ministry of Justice requested that Jalloh be sentenced to 20 years in prison, noting that he had made multiple attempts to join ISIS and tried to obtain a weapon to carry out a murder plot.
“The defendant was fully aware of what he was doing, and the consequences of those actions. His only fear appears to have been a fear that he would hesitate at the critical moment,” prosecutors wrote in a sentencing memorandum.
They added: “By putting the idea of this murder plot in religious terms, and by suggesting that killing members of the US military would be a path to heaven, the defendant demonstrated how strongly he committed to the murderous ideology” of the Islamic State.
Jalloh’s lawyers asked for a prison sentence of 6 1/2 years, and requested that he be placed in a facility that provides residential drug treatment for inmates with addiction and substance abuse problems.
US District Judge Liam O’Grady, an appointee of former President George W. Bush, sentenced him to 11 years in prison.
The judge also ordered Jalloh to participate in a drug abuse testing and treatment program and mental health treatment, and requested that he be evaluated for the federal prison system’s residential drug program.
Completing a residential substance abuse program can reduce an inmate’s prison sentence by up to a year, according to the Federal Bureau of Prisons. It was not immediately clear whether Jalloh qualified for the program. Normally, prisoners serving sentences on terrorism-related charges are not eligible.
Additionally, some inmates who stay out of trouble in prison can reduce their sentence by earning up to 54 days of good conduct credit for each year of their sentence. However, under the 2018 prison reform law known as the First Step Act, prisoners convicted of terrorism-related crimes are not eligible for this credit.
Little is known publicly about Jalloh, who was a naturalized citizen of Sierra Leone. But court documents portray him as a troubled man who was radicalized Anwar Al-Awlakia well-known American imam who became an advocate for Al-Qaeda.
The Virginia Army National Guard confirmed that he served as a specialist from 2009 until 2015, when he was honorably discharged. Jalloh told a government informant that he resigned from the National Guard after hearing lectures from Al-Awlaki, according to a 2016 FBI affidavit in his criminal case.
In a letter to the federal judge who oversaw the sentencing, Jalloh wrote: “I deeply regret that I was led by my emotions rather than my reason and became involved with such an evil organization… I reject and denounce terrorism and any group associated with it, especially ISIS.”
He wrote that he started using drugs after his girlfriend ended their six-year relationship.
“The pain I felt internally was unbearable, and drugs and alcohol were the only things that eased that pain,” Gallo wrote. “I started doing marijuana, coke, and mushrooms using at least one of them on a daily basis in order to kill the pain I was feeling and to fill the void I felt inside.”
The letter itself remains sealed, but his lawyer included excerpts from it in the sentencing memorandum.