{"id":327541,"date":"2026-08-22T21:40:30","date_gmt":"2026-08-22T21:40:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/327541\/"},"modified":"2026-08-22T21:40:30","modified_gmt":"2026-08-22T21:40:30","slug":"isis-plotter-jessica-bowie-threatened-to-blow-up-house-roommates","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/327541\/","title":{"rendered":"ISIS plotter Jessica Bowie threatened to blow up house: roommates"},"content":{"rendered":"

A converted radical Muslim charged with plotting an ISIS-linked bombing at the New York State Capitol<\/a>\u00a0was the roommate from hell who allegedly threatened to blow up their apartment building, her housemates told The Post.<\/p>\n

Jessica Bowie, 35, went on a monthslong reign of terror in her Albany apartment that only ended when she was kicked out for not paying rent, roommates Zephyr Brennan and Ivory Thomas said.<\/p>\n

From January through July, Bowie blasted Islamic prayers at all hours of the night from her bedroom in the Hudson Avenue townhouse and often resorted to violent threats when confronted about her disturbing behavior, the roomies claimed. <\/p>\n

Jessica Bowie, a 35-year-old ISIS-inspired militant, allegedly planned a
deadly attack on the New York State Capitol in Albany.<\/p>\n

\u201cLooking back, the Arabic hymns at 2 a.m. should\u2019ve been a red flag,\u201d Brennan said.<\/p>\n

Chillingly, in her last two weeks at the home, Bowie never took off the head-to-toe Islamic garb \u2014 and concealed her identity entirely from Brennan, who she had known for years prior to converting to Islam, the roommate said.<\/p>\n

Thomas, 23, told The Post she called police seven times since January on Bowie, including to report death threats, but that Albany City Police did nothing to halt the terrorizing.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe tortured me for like six, seven months,\u201d said Thomas, who moved into the apartment on the same day as Bowie in January. \u201cI could be dead right now.\u201d<\/p>\n

Thomas recalled what she said was the first time she was threatened by the accused jihadi Jane.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was sitting in the living room area, I was on the phone with my boyfriend, and she walks past me and says, \u2018I\u2019ll bomb this whole place down,\u2019\u201d Thomas said.<\/p>\n

Ivory, the former roommate of Jessica Bowie said she called police
seven times to report Bowie in the six months they lived together. Lone Pine Press for NY Post<\/p>\n

Terrified by the threat, she said she immediately called the city police and claimed she was told that the issue was a \u201che-said-she-said\u201d and they were unable to take action.<\/p>\n

Another time Thomas called police because of a twisted threat Bowie allegedly screamed when she thought she was home alone.<\/p>\n

\u201c[My boyfriend] hears Jessica saying, \u2018Do you know how easy it is to put rat poison in your food, f\u2014ts?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Thomas said she immediately called the cops, who told her that they were unable to do anything about the threat.<\/p>\n

Jessica Bowie\u2019s bare old room where she would blast Arabic hymns at all hours of the night, according to roommates. Lone Pine Press for NY Post<\/p>\n

In another instance, a squabble over garbage ended with Bowie threatening to kill Thomas, who once again called police. Officers responded to the home but were unable to speak to Bowie, who refused to come out of her room, according to Thomas.<\/p>\n

The Albany Police Department declined to comment on any potential calls made to Bowie\u2019s home. <\/p>\n

Thomas said she also called a child protective service agency once after Bowie\u2019s 11-year-old son, who did not live at the house and who she claimed Bowie allowed to smoke marijuana and Black and Mild cigars during his visits, allegedly harmed her cat. <\/p>\n

Child protective service agencies that operate in Albany declined to comment on any cases potentially opened involving Bowie or her family. <\/p>\n

Jessica Bowie is pictured collecting various items needed to build an explosive device. FBI\/DOJ<\/p>\n

As tensions between the roommates grew, the building\u2019s landlord in May attempted to offer Bowie a room in another apartment nearby, where she would be living with fellow Muslims. Those tenants refused to live with the convert, who they knew from the local mosque Masjid As-Salam, after claiming that she had exploded with anger after hearing a joke she did not like, according to the landlord.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe would go down to the mosque and they would turn her away. When does a mosque turn people away?\u201d said Thomas.<\/p>\n

Brennan, who moved into the apartment just two weeks before Bowie was asked to leave for not paying rent on July 14, was friends with the alleged terrorist in the years before she converted to Islam.<\/p>\n

From 2016 to 2019, Brennan knew Bowie as a talented Schenectady, New York-based prose and poetry writer, visual artist, and a loving mother of two boys.\u00a0<\/p>\n

She was also a recovering heroin addict who had been diagnosed with schizophrenia, said Brennan.<\/p>\n

\u201cI had spoken with her about her [schizophrenia diagnosis]. She was very candid at that point. It was like a throwaway line,\u201d said Brennan. \u201cThere were moments where you could definitely tell she was unwell.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Zephyr Brennan, the former friend and roommate of Jessica Bowie, was unaware for two weeks that he was living with
his ex-pal because she never took off her niqab. Lone Pine Press for NY Post<\/p>\n

But Brennan, 35, was not aware she was living in the same house as an old friend because Bowie,\u00a0who joined Islam five years ago, did not take off her niqab at home. The two had virtually no interaction as Bowie would \u201ctunnel to her bedroom\u201d whenever she came home during that two week span.<\/p>\n

Bowie \u2014 who Brennan knew only as \u201cJessica\u201d \u2014 sinisterly revealed her identity the night she was forced out of the home after not paying rent. <\/p>\n

\u201cShe turned around and she called me by my dead name,\u201d said Brennan, who is transgender. \u201cI had a moment of recognition and my face had dropped. For me to see her full black garb, basically assuming a cosplay of sorts, it was very weird. And she got very very aggressive.\u201d <\/p>\n

Instead of packing her things and leaving the apartment, Bowie allegedly started breaking plates and making threats at Brennan and her partner, Faye Savage.<\/p>\n

Bowie was spotted shopping at Home Depot for supplies she allegedly wanted to use to bomb the capitol building.<\/p>\n

Savage immediately texted the Albany Police Department that Bowie had become violent. Officers responded and escorted Bowie from the property, according to texts provided to The Post.<\/p>\n

After getting tossed out, Bowie left behind a mess of items in garbage bags, including a book called \u201cArtificial Terrorists and Muslim Entrapment After 9\/11.\u201d She used black marker to blot out the faces of the US Marshals and presumed terrorists who were on the cover of the book.<\/p>\n

Many of Bowie\u2019s belongings, including a cache of notebooks, were seized by the FBI on Thursday after her arrest, the roommates said.<\/p>\n

Court documents showed that Bowie \u2014 who is accused of plotting to attack the state capitol building with a bomb hidden in a\u00a0DoorDash food delivery\u00a0<\/a>bag \u2014 told an FBI informant she believed to be an ISIS handler that she would kill her roommates if they got wind of her plan.<\/p>\n

Some of the trash heap of items which Bowie left behind after being kicked out included a book about the FBI investigating terrorism with entrapment tactics. Lone Pine Press for NY Post<\/p>\n

Bowie allegedly joined ISIS through social media earlier this year after a recruiter urged her to take an oath to \u201cobey\u201d the terrorist group\u2019s leader. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe pledge our allegiance to the Commander of the Faithful and the Caliph of the Muslims, the Mujahid Sheikh Abu Hafs al-Hashimi al-Qurashi, to listen and obey,\u201d\u00a0the user instructed her in Arabic to say, according to a federal criminal complaint. <\/p>\n

Bowie allegedly bought bomb materials from a Home Depot <\/a>on Aug. 5, while wearing a burqa, and planned to blow up the Capitol building with help from accomplices, who turned out to be FBI informants, according to federal authorities. She was arrested on Aug. 19 and has been charged with attempting to provide material support to a designated foreign terrorist organization.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A converted radical Muslim charged with plotting an ISIS-linked bombing at the New York State Capitol\u00a0was the roommate…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":327542,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[4241,5970,13057,9,24,55,54,56,10629,3694,58],"class_list":["post-327541","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york-city","tag-albany","tag-fbi","tag-isis","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-new-york-city-headlines","tag-new-york-city-news","tag-ny","tag-roommates","tag-terrorism","tag-us-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/327541","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=327541"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/327541\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/327542"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=327541"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=327541"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=327541"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}