Terror Suspect Worked At 5 Nuke Plants

BUENA, N.J. - Federal regulators say a local man in custody in Yemen as a suspected al-Qaida member worked at five nuclear plant complexes in Maryland, New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission says it's investigating what access Sharif Mobley might have had to sensitive areas.

But the commission says laborers like him would not usually be given security-related or sensitive information. Authorities say he passed federal background checks.

The 26-year-old Mobley worked at the Salem and Hope Creek plants in New Jersey; the Peach Bottom, Limerick and Three Mile Island facilities in Pennsylvania; and Calvert Cliffs in Maryland between 2002 and 2008.

Officials say he was rounded up in an al-Qaida sweep and shot two guards in a Yemeni hospital during an escape attempt. His parents say he is innocent.

Mobley also has a West Philadelphia connection.

According to a report in the Daily News, he once attended the Masjid Quba mosque, located at 47th Street and Lancaster Avenue.

The imam said Mobley indicated in 2007 that he wanted to go to Yemen to learn Arabic, and the imam warned him not to go.

The imam also reportedly said members had concerns Mobley was becoming more radical.

Mobley did go, moving there with his wife and two children. The exact reason he moved there is not clear.

The mosque planned a 4:30 p.m. news conference to further discuss what its leaders know about the terror suspect.

Mobley's father is a long-time union worker, his mother is a professional, and his two sisters are college-educated. How and why he wound up in Yemen is still being investgiated.

People near the parents' home in Buena told Fox 29 News they wouldn't have suspected this.

"He seemed like a normal kid," one neighbor said. "I wouldn't say he's a terrorist but, I mean, I don't know him that well. He just kept to himself. He liked karate and anime and just didn't seem like the kind of kid who would so this, but I guess you never know with people."