June 8 (UPI) -- A former Kansas teacher accused of training a battalion of more than 100 women and girls in Syria to fight for the Islamic State has pleaded guilty to conspiring to provide material support to the foreign terrorist organization, federal prosecutors said.
The Justice Department said in a statement that Allison Fluke-Ekren, 42, pleaded guilty Tuesday and is to be sentenced Oct. 25 when she faces a maximum penalty of 20 years' imprisonment.
According to court documents, Fluke-Ekren was engaged in terrorism activities for Ansar al-Sharia and ISIS from about September 2011 to about May 2019 in several countries including Libya, Iraq and Syria.
In Syria, she led the Khatiba Nusaybah, an all-female ISIS military battalion. She taught the fighters, some who were as young as 10, to use AK-47 rifles, grenades and suicide belts, prosecutors said.
Fluke-Ekren left the United States for Egypt with her second husband, who is now dead but was a member of Ansar al-Sharia, in 2008. In 2011, they moved to Benghazi, Libya, where they were when Ansar al-Sharia attacked the U.S. Special Mission and CIA Annex, killing two CIA contractors.
Fluke-Ekren's husband stole U.S. government documents and at least one electronic device from the U.S. compound and she assisted him with analyzing, reviewing and summarizing their contents, which they handed over to Ansar al-Sharia leadership, the prosecutors said.
The court documents state Fluke-Ekren and her husband in 2012 then moved to Syria where they became members of ISIS.
While there, she received approval in 2016 for the creation of her all-female battalion, which began operations in February of the next year, prosecutors said.
"Fluke-Ekren's main objective as the leader and organizer of the Khatiba Nusaybah battalion was to teach female ISIS members how to defend themselves against ISIS' enemies, including helping male fighters defend ISIS-controlled Raqqa," the Justice Department said, referring the Syrian city. "Fluke-Ekren sought to motivate her trainees by explaining how female fighters can ensure the Islamic State is kept alive by 'helping ISIS expand and to remain' through the use of weapons."
Along with weapons training, she also taught some members of her battalion martial arts, medical training and driving as well as led them in ISIS religious classes and instructed them on how to pack a "go bag" in case of needing to flee.
Fluke-Ekren was originally charged in a 2019 complaint and was arrested in Syria before being transferred to FBI custody in late January.
According to the original charging document, a witness who knew Fluke-Ekren in Syria had said her level of radicalization was "off the charts."
Another witness said Fluke-Ekren instructed this person to send a message to family members stating she had died so the U.S. government would not try to find her.
"Fluke-Ekren informed this same witness and others that it was important to kill the kuffar (disbelievers) and die as martyrs on behalf of ISIS in Syria," the charging document states. "The witness also heard Fluke-Ekren state that she never wanted to return to the United States and that she wanted to die in Syria as a martyr."
