US soldier accused of planning neo-Nazi attack on unit in Turkey pleads not guilty

Jul 7, 2020

A US Army soldier charged last month with conspiring with members of an occult neo-Nazi network to attack his own unit during an upcoming deployment to Turkey has pled not guilty, prosecutors said.

Twenty-two-year-old Ethan Melzer of Louisville, Kentucky, entered his plea on Monday.

Melzer allegedly used an encrypted messaging app to recruit other members of a self-proclaimed satanic network known as the Order of the Nine Angles (O9A) to help recruit local jihadists in Turkey to carry out an attack on a US military facility that Melzer’s unit would soon be guarding.

The soldier told O9A members that his unit would be lightly armed and that the facility they would be guarding could be easily overrun by a few dozen fighters attacking from nearby high ground, prosecutors said. Messages obtained by investigators and allegedly sent by Melzer suggested he was willing to die in the attack in hope of sparking a war in the Middle East.

The plan was thwarted in May and the Justice Department announced charges against Melzer in June. Prosecutors say Melzer confessed to the plot, waived his Miranda rights and described himself as a traitor in interviews.