Three Ohio men guilty in Iraq-linked terrorism case

CINCINNATI (Reuters) - Three residents of the state of Ohio were convicted on Friday of plotting attacks on Americans overseas, including the killing of U.S. soldiers in Iraq, the Department of Justice said.

A federal jury in Toledo, Ohio convicted Mohammad Amawi, 28, Marwan El-Hindi, 45, and Wassim Mazloum, 27, of conspiring to kill or maim Americans and planning support for terrorists, the department said in a press release.

Sometime prior to June 2004 all three defendants engaged in a conspiracy that involved firearms training and instructions to build improvised explosive devices and suicide bomb vests, the Justice Department said.

They also sought to recruit others to participate in jihad training, solicited funding for the training, and proposed sites for training in firearms, explosives and hand-to-hand combat, the department said in a statement.

Amawi is a dual Jordanian-U.S. citizen, El-Hindi is a naturalized U.S. citizen born in Jordan and Mazloum is a U.S. legal permanent resident from Lebanon.

The men were charged in February 2007. They face maximum sentences of life imprisonment.

"This case demonstrates the stark reality of home-grown terrorism. If a plot like this can be developed in Toledo, Ohio, it can happen anywhere," C. Frank Figliuzzi, Special Agent in Charge of the FBI Cleveland Division said in the statement.

Sentences will be determined after review by the court and "in most cases, it will be less than the maximum," the Justice Department said.

(Reporting by Andrea Hopkins, Editing by Anthony Boadle)