Va. man indicted in Facebook threat against Metro

ALEXANDRIA, Va. – A Virginia man faces charges of issuing threats on Facebook to detonate pipe bombs on the D.C. subway system and in the city's Georgetown neighborhood.

Twenty-five-year-old Awais Younis (eh-WAYS YOO-niss) of Arlington, a native of Afghanistan, was arrested in November after an acquaintance contacted the FBI. The acquaintance was alarmed by comments made by Younis during a Facebook chat about building pipe bombs with specific types of shrapnel to cause maximum damage on the Metro system.

The federal indictment for interstate communication of a threat came Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Alexandria.

A magistrate judge ordered Younis be held and receive a mental health evaluation.

Younis' attorney, federal public defender Todd Richman, declined comment.