Mounties grapple with 848 terror probes

OTTAWA, May 8 (UPI) -- Seven of 848 national security cases being investigated by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police are large and frightening, a senior Mountie said.

Speaking Wednesday in Ottawa to the Conference Board of Canada gathering of security, industry and government experts, RCMP Assistant Commissioner Mike McDonell said the seven cases are spread across the country and "keep me awake at night," the Ottawa Citizen reported Thursday.

In an interview after the address, McDonell told the newspaper since the U.S. terror attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, the RCMP's national security section's caseload has grown 780 percent.

"What we're onto scares us," he said. "What we're not onto really scares us."

He described most of the suspects as being young, second- or third-generation Islamic immigrants with a secular background, the newspaper said.

"I look at them as terrorist wannabes," McDonell said in his speech. "Being a wannabe does not make them any less dangerous; in fact, I would argue it makes them more dangerous. Not ideologically motivated, they are emotionally motivated, motivated by images -- rapes, murders, arrests creating moral outrage."