Young Hephzibah woman suspected of assisting the Islamic State terrorist group

A young Hephzibah woman accused of aiding the Islamic State while still in high school has been granted bond.

In a consent order signed Monday, Kim A. Vo was granted a $25,000 bond. Vol was 20 when she was arrested in March 2019. A federal grand jury in the Southern District of New York indicted her the following month on a charge of conspiracy to provide material support to a designated foreign terrorist organization.

Vo’s bond has several special conditions: home detention with electronic monitoring, no access to a computer or the internet via any device, and she is to cooperate with a pretrial diversion program.

If Vo is not accepted into the Disruption and Early Engagement program within one week after her release, she agreed to return to the government’s custody.

Vo is accused of helping to spread Islamic State propaganda and recruit members, such as a 14-year-old Norwegian who created video games for the terrorist group.

According to the indictment, between April 2016 and May 2017, Vo allegedly belonged to online groups calling for an attack on a New York-based nonprofit and a hit list of thousands of Americans to be killed.

Vo voluntarily contacted the FBI in July 2017.

According to her parents, Vo’s only interest was in studying computer science, and she hoped to one day work for the FBI in cybersecurity, The Augusta Chronicle first reported last year.

Source: Augusta Chronicle