A South Carolina teenager imprisoned for a plot to attack American troops in the name of ISIS has been released after serving just one year of his five year sentence. The Syrian-American 17-year-old, who has not been named, was sentenced to five years in juvenile detention on gun charges for acts that occurred when he was just 15 years old, but wasn’t prosecuted on federal terrorism charges. York County Sheriff Bruce Bryant said he was “devastated” the teen was released, but his lawyer told The Daily Beast in September that he believes the 17-year-old is not a threat. Rather, the boy became more interested in what’s happening in Syria after his father died, and was seduced into an ISIS-related plot by an older man.

"He never was anti-American or anything like that. His whole thing was going to Syria, and being with the Syrian Free Army,” BJ Barrowclough said. "There was no anti-American sentiment, there was no wanting to go join ISIS and be a terrorist."

—Katie Zavadski