LANSING, Mich. — Authorities have announced that a third individual from Michigan is facing charges related to a planned terror attack intended for Halloween. The suspect reportedly visited a Midwestern amusement park to assess the location, according to investigators.

Federal officials revealed that Ayob Nasser, 19, was apprehended on Wednesday. He is accused of being involved in orchestrating a potential attack targeting LGBTQ+ bars near Detroit, allegedly motivated by extremist ideologies linked to the Islamic State.

In a related development on Wednesday evening, Acting U.S. Attorney Alina Habba of New Jersey stated in a social media video that her office had filed charges against two additional individuals believed to be connected to the conspiracy. However, the specifics of these charges have yet to be released to the public.

According to court filings, Nasser, along with his brother Mohmed Ali and another suspect, Majed Mahmoud, are facing charges of conspiring to provide material support to a recognized terrorist group. They are also accused of acquiring and distributing firearms and ammunition with the intent to facilitate terrorism.

Mohmed Ali and Majed Mahmoud were taken into custody last Friday. Investigators have also indicated that two minors, referred to as Person 1 and Person 2 in the legal documents, were involved in the alleged planning.

“We will not stop. We will follow the tentacles where they lead. We will continue to stand guard with the FBI against terrorism,” said U.S. Attorney Jerome F. Gorgon Jr. said in a statement.

It was unclear whether Nasser has an attorney. An attorney representing Nasser in an unrelated civil lawsuit, Hussein Shadi Bazzi, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

According to court records, Nasser is one of two people being sued in federal court by the makers of the popular video game Fortnite. The two are accused of making thousands of fake “bot” accounts that earned “tens of thousands of dollars in unearned payments.”

Two attorneys representing Ali and Mahmoud declined to comment when reached by phone Wednesday evening, and both said they are reading through an amended 93-page complaint filed in federal court. One of the attorneys, Amir Makled, over the weekend seemed to wave off the allegations, saying they were the result of “hysteria” and “fear-mongering.”

Ali and Mahmoud made brief appearances in federal court Monday and will remain in custody at least until a Nov. 10 detention hearing.

FBI agents had surveilled the group for weeks, even using a camera on a pole outside a Dearborn house, according to the court filing. Investigators also got access to encrypted chats and other conversations and scoured social media posts.

According to the court filing, investigators searched the residences of the group, an auto repair shop operated by Ali and Nasser’s family and a storage unit rented by Ali. Authorities found AR-15-style rifles, ammunition, loaded handguns and GoPro cameras, as well as tactical vests and backpacks.

Five cellular devices were also seized, the FBI said.

Investigators said that Ali, Mahmoud and one of the minors, Person 1, visited bars in Ferndale, a northern suburb of Detroit, despite all being under the legal drinking age. The city attracts tens of thousands of people to its annual Pride parade.

Nasser and Person 2 traveled twice in September to “an amusement park in the Midwest, approximately three hours from Dearborn, Michigan,” court documents say, citing phone records and surveillance footage. Investigators say a computer at the home of Nasser and Ali revealed that someone had searched “is it crowded on halloweekend” at the amusement park.

The documents do not name the amusement park. But Cedar Point, an amusement park near Cleveland, Ohio, appears to match the description and special Halloween hours outlined in the complaint. A spokesperson for Cedar Point did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In the new court filing, investigators said a group chat between the men indicated a Halloween attack with repeated references to pumpkins and pumpkin emojis. In the group chat, one of the unnamed conspirators wrote “American Jewish Center,” and Nasser responded “pumpkin sounds good now.”

The court filing says Person 1 regularly consulted the father of a “local Islamic extremist ideologue” about when to commit a “good deed.”

Phone records also showed members of the group looked up information on various mass killings, including the 2016 Pulse nightclub shooting and the deadly 2025 New Orleans truck attack.