A woman accused of planning an ISIS-inspired bombing at the New York State Capitol had already alarmed her Albany roommates, who claim she threatened to blow up their apartment building, they told The Post.
Jessica Bowie, 35, allegedly created months of fear inside the Hudson Avenue apartment she shared with Zephyr Brennan and Ivory Thomas, a situation they said ended only after she was removed for failing to pay rent.
Between January and July, Bowie repeatedly played Islamic prayers from her bedroom late into the night and, when confronted about the noise or her behavior, allegedly responded with violent threats, her roommates claimed.
“Looking back, the Arabic hymns at 2 a.m. should’ve been a red flag,” Brennan said.
Brennan said Bowie’s behavior grew more unsettling in her final two weeks at the home, claiming she wore full-body Islamic clothing without removing it and completely concealed her identity from Brennan, who had known her for years before Bowie converted to Islam.
Thomas, 23, told The Post she contacted police seven times since January about Bowie, including reports of alleged death threats, but said Albany City Police failed to stop the escalating situation.
“She tortured me for like six, seven months,” said Thomas, who moved into the apartment the same day as Bowie in January. “I could be dead right now.”
Thomas also described what she said was the first threat she received from Bowie, now accused in the alleged Capitol bombing plot.
“I was sitting in the living room area, I was on the phone with my boyfriend, and she walks past me and says, ‘I’ll bomb this whole place down,’” Thomas said.
Terrified by the threat, she said she immediately called the city police and claimed she was told that the issue was a “he-said-she-said” and they were unable to take action.
Another time Thomas called police because of a twisted threat Bowie allegedly screamed when she thought she was home alone.
“[My boyfriend] hears Jessica saying, ‘Do you know how easy it is to put rat poison in your food, f—ts?’”
Thomas said she immediately called the cops, who told her that they were unable to do anything about the threat.
In another instance, a squabble over garbage ended with Bowie threatening to kill Thomas, who once again called police. Officers responded to the home but were unable to speak to Bowie, who refused to come out of her room, according to Thomas.
The Albany Police Department declined to comment on any potential calls made to Bowie’s home.
Thomas said she also called a child protective service agency once after Bowie’s 11-year-old son, who did not live at the house and who she claimed Bowie allowed to smoke marijuana and Black and Mild cigars during his visits, allegedly harmed her cat.
Child protective service agencies that operate in Albany declined to comment on any cases potentially opened involving Bowie or her family.
As tensions between the roommates grew, the building’s landlord in May attempted to offer Bowie a room in another apartment nearby, where she would be living with fellow Muslims. Those tenants refused to live with the convert, who they knew from the local mosque Masjid As-Salam, after claiming that she had exploded with anger after hearing a joke she did not like, according to the landlord.
“She would go down to the mosque and they would turn her away. When does a mosque turn people away?” said Thomas.
Brennan, who moved into the apartment just two weeks before Bowie was asked to leave for not paying rent on July 14, was friends with the alleged terrorist in the years before she converted to Islam.
From 2016 to 2019, Brennan knew Bowie as a talented Schenectady, New York-based prose and poetry writer, visual artist, and a loving mother of two boys.
She was also a recovering heroin addict who had been diagnosed with schizophrenia, said Brennan.
“I had spoken with her about her [schizophrenia diagnosis]. She was very candid at that point. It was like a throwaway line,” said Brennan. “There were moments where you could definitely tell she was unwell.”
But Brennan, 35, was not aware she was living in the same house as an old friend because Bowie, who joined Islam five years ago, did not take off her niqab at home. The two had virtually no interaction as Bowie would “tunnel to her bedroom” whenever she came home during that two week span.
Bowie — who Brennan knew only as “Jessica” — sinisterly revealed her identity the night she was forced out of the home after not paying rent.
“She turned around and she called me by my dead name,” said Brennan, who is transgender. “I had a moment of recognition and my face had dropped. For me to see her full black garb, basically assuming a cosplay of sorts, it was very weird. And she got very very aggressive.”
Instead of packing her things and leaving the apartment, Bowie allegedly started breaking plates and making threats at Brennan and her partner, Faye Savage.
Savage immediately texted the Albany Police Department that Bowie had become violent. Officers responded and escorted Bowie from the property, according to texts provided to The Post.
After getting tossed out, Bowie left behind a mess of items in garbage bags, including a book called “Artificial Terrorists and Muslim Entrapment After 9/11.” She used black marker to blot out the faces of the US Marshals and presumed terrorists who were on the cover of the book.
Many of Bowie’s belongings, including a cache of notebooks, were seized by the FBI on Thursday after her arrest, the roommates said.
Court documents showed that Bowie — who is accused of plotting to attack the state capitol building with a bomb hidden in a DoorDash food delivery bag — told an FBI informant she believed to be an ISIS handler that she would kill her roommates if they got wind of her plan.
Bowie allegedly joined ISIS through social media earlier this year after a recruiter urged her to take an oath to “obey” the terrorist group’s leader.
“We pledge our allegiance to the Commander of the Faithful and the Caliph of the Muslims, the Mujahid Sheikh Abu Hafs al-Hashimi al-Qurashi, to listen and obey,” the user instructed her in Arabic to say, according to a federal criminal complaint.
Bowie allegedly bought bomb materials from a Home Depot on Aug. 5, while wearing a burqa, and planned to blow up the Capitol building with help from accomplices, who turned out to be FBI informants, according to federal authorities. She was arrested on Aug. 19 and has been charged with attempting to provide material support to a designated foreign terrorist organization.
