American teen convicted for trying to join ISIS; gets 4 years in prison

The first American to be convicted of trying to join the Islamic State was sentenced to four years in federal prison on Friday, though the teenage Muslim convert said she was manipulated and does not support violent jihad.

The sentence which was handed down on Friday follows the arrest of the 19-year-old Shannon Maureen Conley by FBI agents at Denver International Airport in April 2014. Conley had been boarding a plane bound for Germany with the intention of joining the Islamic State effort. She told agents she was going to Turkey to await word from an Islamic State member in Syria, allegedly Yousr Mouelhi, whom she planned to marry.

Conley said she intended to become a nurse in an Islamic State (formerly ISIS) camp, and is currently a Colorado-certified nurse’s aide. The 19-year-old, now Amatullah Maureen Conley, has struck up an online relationship last year with a Tunisian man, Yousr Mouelhi, whom the FBI alleged in court documents was a member of IS.

IS has been designated a terrorist organization by the United States government, and Conley pleaded guilty to the charges. Culled