South ABQ News

Federal authorities continue to hold a University of New Mexico engineering student from Saudi Arabia, who may have been planning to kill people with an illegal handgun.

Attorneys for Hassan Alqahtani, 28, say that authorities have no evidence that he had plans to use the gun, only the allegations of an unnamed informant. Under U.S. law, Alqahtani, who has a non-immigrant visa, is not permitted to own a handgun. 

A search of his home on Dec. 12, turned up a .380-caliber Cobra handgun, the FBI said in an affidavit. Alqahtani, who faces 10 years in prison if charges are brought and he is convicted, turned himself in to federal authorities the next day.

A .380-caliber Cobra handgun

"Alqahtani is not currently charged with anything other than possession of a firearm,” a spokesman for the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of New Mexico told NBC News.

Alqahtani has an American-born wife, who one of his attorneys says is the owner of the handgun. As an American citizen, under the law, the wife has the right to own a handgun.

However, when questioned, the wife could not identify the make and model of the firearm, the affidavit says. The FBI agent wrote in the affidavit that Alqahtani’s wife may have been conspiring with him to conceal his ownership of the gun. 

The Albuquerque Journal and NBC News have reported that an acquaintance of Alqahtani's called the National Threat Operations Center tipline in August to tell authorities that Alqahtani had purchased the gun this summer, with the intention of killing several people, including one of his professors and the tipster. The affidavit says that the unnamed informant told the FBI that Alqahtani said that his cousin bought the gun in the U.S. before the cousin returned to Saudi Arabia.

Alqahtani’s arrest came just days after a Saudi citizen in Pensacola, Florida used a handgun on Dec. 6 to kill 3 sailors. The gunman was a member of the Saudi military who was in Pensacola for training at the base. 

The FBI said the Pensacola gunman bought the Glock nine-millimeter handgun in a legal purchase in July, using a hunting license, which is one of the exceptions under the law. The Pensacola gunman was killed during the attack.

Alqahtani had been scheduled to graduate from engineering school on Dec. 14.