Digital Forensics Dispatch

Chatroom Data Assists In finding Ohio Man Guilty in Plot to Ambush and Kidnap Law Enforcement Officers

May 13, 2021

The US Attorney’s Office of the Northern District of Ohio recently released a press report detailing that Christian Ferguson of Cleveland, OH was found guilty on two counts of attempted kidnapping. Ferguson was arrested on May 8, 2020 after placing a fake distress call to law enforcement officers. The FBI apparently received a call-in complaint in April of 2020 about a violent and extremist posting made in an online chatroom. It was later determined that the poster of the comments was identified as Ferguson.

 The release states “In these postings, Ferguson expressed a desire to call in false in-progress calls to the police in order to lure law enforcement to a remote location where they could be robbed of their weapons and body armor and possibly killed.” The FBI then introduced a confidential source into the chatroom, which Ferguson controlled.

More details about Ferguson’s plot were discussed in March of 2020 on the chatroom site. Through the use of confidential sources, the FBI and other local agencies were able to thwart the plot and make the arrest. A federal jury found Ferguson guilty on May 7, 2020 of the two kidnapping charges. Ferguson’s sentencing is set to take place August 27, 2020. The Acting U.S. Attorney Bridget M. Brennan said “’The community members who reported this plan, and the federal agents who worked to prevent it, should be commended for their actions. Lives were saved.”

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