DETROIT — Federal prosecutors unsealed an indictment Wednesday against eight people linked to the University of Michigan accused of orchestrating plans to threaten university leaders, police and businesses with a wave of crimes designed to force the university to sever ties with Israel.

The 63-page indictment accuses the defendants of using encrypted chats to research, target and attack victims as well as social media amid a campaign of threats that emerged amid Israel's war with Hamas in Gaza, according to the government.

The charges came after top UM officials and their homes had been targeted by demonstrations and vandalism in the past few years as protesters demanded that the university halt its endowment investments in military contractors and Israeli companies because of Israel's war against Hamas in Gaza. UM regents and officials rejected the demands, arguing that such a move would violate university policy and that the targeted investments comprised a minuscule portion of the endowment.

"Their criminal activity included spray painting threats, breaking windows, and throwing glass jars filled with noxious chemicals into family homes," the federal indictment reads. "They marked their victims with threatening symbols used by Hamas, including red inverted triangles and red handprints. They used the internet and social media to broadcast their message to ensure their threats and commitment to continuing criminal activity were heard by their victims and others who support Israel."

The indictment marks the latest federal entanglement for UM and members of the university community, coming after waves of arrests of scholars from China accused of smuggling biological material into the U.S. The case also represents continued fallout from pro-Palestinian campus protests.

Eight former employees sued the university in May 2025, claiming university officials denied their First Amendment rights of freedom of speech, protest and making demands of their government. The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan, also said university officials violated the employees' due process rights. An amended complaint later added that the officials conspired to dissuade them from filing the lawsuit.

The group of defendants, whom the government said are associated with the university, is accused of targeting numerous UM officials from October 2023 through April 2025, including the university president, who was Santa Ono at the time; the chief investment officer; the provost; members of the Board of Regents and others.

“In America, we rule by law, not by fear," Detroit U.S. Attorney Jerome Gorgon said in a statement. "These alleged threats and attempts to terrorize government officials, businesses, and the Jewish Federation are anti-American. We will counter intimidation with justice.”

Federal Magistrate Judge Anthony Patti ordered on Wednesday that the eight defendants be held by U.S. marshals until a 1 p.m. Friday detention hearing. The defendants were represented by a federal community defender but indicated that they intended to retain attorneys in the future.

Demonstrators, regent respond to federal criminal charges

While the defendants sat in Patti’s courtroom, about two dozen protesters chanted outside the Detroit federal courthouse.

The demonstrators chanted “free Palestine,” asked how many more pro-Palestinian activists the FBI would arrest and compared the FBI to the Ku Klux Klan and the Israel Defense Forces. The protesters held Palestinian flags and signs decorated in the colors of the flag.

Andrew Thompson, a lecturer at the University of Michigan, said he stopped by the protest to show solidarity.

Thompson said he felt those charged are being subjected to discipline more than other individuals associated with UM who have protested on the Ann Arbor campus.

“I’m tired of the Palestinian exemption,” he said, referring to being exempted from free speech protections.

Some activists have been barred from employment with the university for taking part in protests, he said.

“This is a First Amendment issue,” Thompson said. “I don’t think people who exercise their right to free speech should be barred from employment with essentially an arm of the government.”

But UM Regent Sarah Hubbard, whose house was "decorated" with body bags by pro-Palestinian protesters in May 2024, commended the federal prosecution as she retweeted a social media post by FBI Director Kash Patel about the indictments.

"I’m very appreciative of the tireless work done by various levels of law enforcement on the University of Michigan campus, in Michigan and across the United States to bring this matter forward," Hubbard wrote on X on Wednesday.

Feds outline who is being charged in the indictment

Those charged in the indictment unsealed Wednesday are: Zainab Hakim, 23, of Canton Township; Amatullah Hakim, 21, of Ann Arbor; Paige Feyock, 26, of Ann Arbor; Ahmet Korkaya, 28, of Milwaukee, Wisconsin; Jonathan Zou, 22, of Ann Arbor; Alexander Sepulveda, 23, of Chicago; Mariam Odeh, 24, of Dearborn; and Colin Weger, 24, of Ann Arbor.

The indictment charged members of the group with conspiracy to transmit threats in interstate and foreign commerce. That crime is punishable by up to five years in federal prison.

Zainab Hakim and Feyock are facing the most serious charges of witness intimidation, a 20-year felony. That charge involves allegations that the two threatened an unnamed UM student in July 2024 in hopes of preventing the victim from informing a law enforcement officer about the campaign of threats, according to the indictment.

The indictment also charges Sepulveda with destruction of property — a five-year felony.

For example, in one chat from May 2024, Feyock and Korkaya, at the time a medical student, exchanged messages and agreed to “kill,” “torment” and “terrorize” unidentified targets, including the university president at the time — who was Santa Ono and who is listed in the indictment as “Victim 4,” or V-4.

“We are finding (V-4’s) address if we don’t have it already (so I can) drive my car into it,” Korkaya wrote. “(V-4’s) entire family is now on my hit list.”

“Lets get (V-4’s) kids bruh ...,” Feyock wrote.

Members of the group lived, worked and/or attended school locally and targeted victims by using social media platforms linked to UM student groups, including the former Students Allied for Freedom and Equality (the University of Michigan's chapter of "Justice in Palestine") and the pro-divestment Tahrir Coalition, according to the government.

“No one has the right to threaten, intimidate, and coerce public officials, law enforcement officers, community institutions, or their families," Jennifer Runyan, special agent in charge of the FBI field office in Detroit, said in a statement.

"In the dead of night, masked and hooded defendants allegedly threw noxious chemicals through the windows of families’ homes and taped demand letters to their front doors," she added. "At every step they attempted to cover their tracks and delete evidence of their crimes."

Ono's home in West Bloomfield was vandalized on the one-year anniversary of the Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel by Hamas that killed an estimated 1,200 people, mostly civilians. About 250 hostages also were taken.

The messages at Ono's home were spray-painted in red on his house and sidewalk. They included "Coward," "Divest now," along with upside-down triangles and "intifada," an Arabic word meaning uprising or resistance, according to photos reviewed by The Detroit News and confirmed by three UM regents.

The indictment includes allegations involving another victim, a UM regent whose law firm was vandalized on June 3, 2024. Details in the indictment match prior news coverage about vandalism at Regent Jordan Acker’s law firm in Southfield on June 3, 2024.

Days earlier, prosecutors allege Zainab Hakim searched online for supplies, including water balloons and spray paint.

On June 1, Zainab Hakim took a photo of Amatullah Hakim in their family’s garage showing Amatullah “filling balloons with red paint and smiling at the camera while holding up her ‘bloody hands,’” the indictment reads.

Two days later, on June 3, prosecutors say the Hakims and others vandalized the regent’s law firm “by throwing red paint balloons at the building and leaving imprinted red painted handprints on the windows.”

They also spraypainted messages on the building and sidewalk, including “DIVEST OR F--- OFF” “UM KILLS,” “FREE PALESTINE” and “DIVEST NOW.”

Acker did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment.

The federal case was unsealed amid a rise in threats to politicians and public officials nationwide, according to federal court records.

There have been more than 850 threat-related cases filed nationally since 2013, including a record-high 133 last year, according to research by the University of Nebraska Omaha’s National Counterterrorism Innovation, Technology, and Education Center and Chapman University. The number of cases this year is on pace to exceed last year's record total.

The indictment also comes after the administration of President Donald Trump, an ally of Israel, last year accused the University of Michigan, among other universities, of insufficiently protecting Jewish students from antisemitism. The Trump administration's Department of Education last year threatened to pull funding after canceling $400 million in grants and contracts to Columbia University in New York City.

Last year, Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel dropped charges of trespassing and resisting police against 11 pro-Palestinian activists accused in clashes at an on-campus encampment that the university police dismantled. None of those activists are named in the federal indictment.

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