The Bangladesh-born Akayed Ullah, in the service of violent jihad in December 2017, set off a large home-built pipe bomb during morning rush hour beneath the Port Authority Bus Terminal in New York City. The bomb misfired and injured only him and three bystanders but would have claimed a great many more had it exploded as intended.
The Brooklyn resident entered the United States in 2011 at age 20 with his mother and three siblings on an extended-family reunification visa applied for by a supposed U.S.-citizen uncle. Adjudicators approved the family's lawful permanent residence visas quickly. Granted, American adjudicators in 2011 may not have been able to pick up on evidence at that time suggesting Ullah hewed to extremist ideology; the post-attack FBI investigation found evidence of radicalization only dating to 2014, when Ullah began posting on social media and plotting to commit violence.
Still, USCIS agents may have uncovered Ullah’s predispositions when the security vetting window opened elsewhere: Ullah was never related to his supposed “uncle”, according to more recent media reports, meaning Ullah, his siblings, their mother, and the “uncle” would have been implicated in visa fraud had adjudicators interviewed family members and associates.
The family would never have been granted the visas in 2011 had this detectable fraud been detected and therefore Ullah would not have been present when he began radicalizing in 2014 or for the 2017 attack he ultimately committed.
Far too late, DHS reportedly moved to deport his mother and siblings for fraudulently obtaining visas for which they were ineligible. Had that been discovered at the time of application the bombing would never have happened. In 2018, Ullah was convicted of six federal charges related to the terrorism bombing and sentenced to life in prison.