Suburban Chicago Man Sentenced to 18 Years in Prison for Trafficking Fentanyl and Attempting To Support ISIS

CHICAGO - A suburban Chicago man has been sentenced to 18 years in federal prison for trafficking fentanyl and attempting to provide material support to the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham, also known as ISIS.

On three occasions in 2019, JASON BROWN provided $500 in cash to an individual with the understanding that the money would be wired to an ISIS soldier engaged in terrorist activity in Syria. Unbeknownst to Brown, the individual to whom he provided the money was confidentially working with law enforcement, and the purported ISIS fighter was actually an undercover law enforcement officer.

Also in 2019, Brown trafficked fentanyl and other drugs from California to the Chicago suburbs and illegally possessed several loaded handguns in furtherance of his drug trafficking activities.

Brown, 42, of Lombard, Ill., pleaded guilty last year to one count of attempting to provide material support to ISIS, one count of distributing fentanyl, and one count of possessing a firearm in furtherance of a drug trafficking crime. U.S. District Judge Mary M. Rowland imposed the sentence on Oct. 16, 2024, during a hearing in federal court in Chicago. Brown has been in law enforcement custody since his arrest in 2019.

The sentence was announced by Morris Pasqual, Acting United States Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, Matthew G. Olsen, Assistant Attorney General for National Security at the U.S. Department of Justice, Douglas S. DePodesta, Special Agent-in-Charge of the Chicago Field Office of the FBI, Ramsey E. Covington, Acting Special Agent-in-Charge of IRS Criminal Investigation Chicago Field Office, and Larry Snelling, Superintendent of the Chicago Police Department. Substantial assistance was provided by the Illinois State Police, U.S. Postal Inspection Service, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Homeland Security Investigations, Lombard, Ill. Police Department, Addison, Ill. Police Department, and FBI Field Offices in Atlanta, Los Angeles, and San Diego. The government was represented by Assistant U.S. Attorney Shawn McCarthy of the Northern District of Illinois and S. Elisa Poteat, Trial Attorney from the Justice Department's National Security Division, Counterterrorism Section.