Biography
Laguerre Payen is a Haitian-born Newburgh, New York resident with schizophrenia and an intellectual disability who was recruited by FBI informant Shahed Hussain into the 2009 Newburgh sting. Federal agents arrested Payen and three co-defendants on May 20, 2009. A jury convicted him in October 2010, and Judge Colleen McMahon sentenced him on September 7, 2011 to the mandatory minimum of 25 years in prison followed by five years of supervised release. In July 2023, McMahon reduced the sentence to time served plus 90 days, citing the government-created nature of the plot and Payen's vulnerability. Payen was not released. He was transferred to the federal medical center in Springfield, Missouri, and on January 9, 2024 a federal court ordered his continued civil commitment under 18 U.S.C. § 4246. The Eighth Circuit affirmed that order on July 18, 2025.
