A Beaumont teenager accused of trying to join the Islamic State had a brief court hearing in Edmonton on Thursday morning.
The 17-year-old appeared via closed circuit television. The teen was dressed in a black sweatshirt, his sandy-brown hair neatly styled. Hands clasped in front of him, he stared out at the courtroom and appeared to be calm.
None of the boy’s relatives were in court.
The teen’s defence lawyer asked for the case to be put over. His client will remain in custody until his next court date, scheduled for April 20.
The boy was arrested in Beaumont last month by the RCMP’s integrated national security enforcement team.
He was charged with trying to leave the country to fight with the Islamic State, an organization that controls a vast tract of territory in Syria and northern Iraq.
The teen can’t be identified because he is underage. He faces two specific charges: That he tried to leave Canada to commit an act of terror, and that he tried to leave the country to join a terrorist group.
The charges accuse the teen of trying to leave the country to commit “murder in circumstances that constitute terrorist activity.”
The charges were added to the Criminal Code in 2013, as part of the Combating Terrorism Act.
