Plea hearing in Va. for accused Pentagon shooter


January 26, 2012 at 11:36a.m.

Plea hearing in Va. for accused Pentagon shooter

ALEXANDRIA, Va. (AP) — An ex-Marine from Virginia is expected to enter a guilty plea related to charges that he fired shots at the Pentagon, the Marine Corps museum in Quantico and other military-related targets.

A plea-agreement hearing is scheduled today for 24-year-old Yonathan Melaku of Alexandria. Prosecutors charged Melaku last year, saying they had evidence linking him to a series of overnight shootings in 2010 at a number of military buildings in northern Virginia. No one was injured.

Court records do not yet specify the exact charges in the plea agreement.

Melaku was arrested in June when he was spotted after dark in Arlington National Cemetery with a backpack containing potential explosives material and notations referring to jihad and Osama bin Laden. That arrest set off a security scare around the Pentagon.