Father’s Dramatic 911 Call Unmasks Son as an ISIS Recruit

— -- In a chilling 911 call released today, a distraught father and an angry son can be heard arguing about whether the young man is an ISIS sympathizer, and why he was burning religious icons in the family home. That 911 call, the FBI said, first alerted them that 19-year old Justin Sullivan had been radicalized by watching ISIS videos and was planning a violent attack.

Sullivan’s father told the 911 operator, “He got into his mind that he can destroy all our religious (items) … I don’t know if it’s ISIS or what, but I come home and he’s destroying Buddhas and figurines and burning stuff in the house.”

At one point during the call, Justin Sullivan can be heard yelling at his father, “You want to kill me? They’re going to put me in jail my whole life ... Why are you trying to say I’m a terrorist? I didn’t even do anything.”

In April, Sullivan’s father dialed the Burke County, North Carolina police after coming home and discovering that his son was pouring a flammable liquid over religious icons and setting them on fire.

“This is not the first time he’s destroyed all of our stuff,” he told the operator.

He first said he thought his son had used lighter fluid. On the 911 recording, he asked Sullivan, “What kind of gas?”

Sullivan replied, “Gas from the shed.”

The father said, “You put gasoline in the house!”

Then the father and son had this exchange:

“I destroyed a lot of things,” Sullivan said. “I didn't destroy just the Buddhas. I destroyed a lot of things.”

“Why?” his father asked.

“Why are you trying to ... You’re going to throw me in jail my whole life and kill me,” Sullivan replied. “You want to kill me? They’re going to put me in jail my whole life, just 'cause you’re trying to say ... Why are you trying to say I’m a terrorist? I didn’t even do anything.”

After that 911 call, an FBI undercover agent reached out to Sullivan, and according to charging documents in the case, the young man asked the agent to kill his parents.

Documents in the case charge that Sullivan also shared his plans to purchase an AR-15 assault rifle and gun down “a large number of citizens.”

Sullivan allegedly had plans for a “mass attack” as well — one that would kill as many as 1,000 people. According to the charging document, Sullivan told the undercover officer, “500 is an incorrect body count...” He said 1,000 was correct, “I’m thinking about using biological weapons ... coat our bullets with cyanide ... and then set off a gas bomb to finish the rest.”

In one of his last conversations with the undercover agent, Sullivan talked about a second attack, “We could use a U-Haul packed with bombs and then detonate it."

Sullivan was arrested at the family’s Morganton, North Carolina home Friday, and charged with one count of attempting to provide material support to [ISIS], one count of transporting and receiving a silencer in interstate commerce with intent to commit a felony, and one count of receipt and possession of an unregistered silencer, unidentified by a serial number. The charge of conspiracy to provide material support to a designated foreign organization carries a maximum potential penalty of 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine.