New York police increased security, including vehicle checkpoints in midtown Manhattan and armed guards in front of the Office of Emergency Management, after receiving credible information that terrorists may be plotting an attack in the city around the Sept. 11 10th anniversary.
Police cruisers took up positions on midtown blocks on Lexington, Park and Fifth avenues today as officers stopped trucks and other vehicles for inspection. Drivers were made to open the storage spaces of delivery trucks for police. In Brooklyn, U.S. marshals armed with machine guns guarded the federal courthouse and increased security was observed in front of the nearby city emergency management office.
“We have already had a full complement of people working shifts because of the Sept. 11 anniversary prior to this,” said Jim Margolin, a spokesman for the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s New York office. “We are taking the logical investigative measures to assess this threat.”
The threat concerns a possible al-Qaida-sponsored attack targeting New York or Washington on or near the anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, attack, said a U.S. official, who wasn’t authorized to discuss the matter publicly. The official said the intelligence concerns a possible vehicle-borne attack, perhaps on a transportation hub or bottleneck, and cautioned that the options may be broader than a car or truck bombing.
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