Live-in helper was 'Jihad Jane' terrorist

A US woman who was the live-in caretaker for her boyfriend's elderly father, told a judge that she had worked secretly online under the name Jihad Jane to support Islamic terrorists and had moved overseas to further her plan to kill a Swedish artist who had offended Muslims.

Colleen LaRose, 47, from the small Pennsylvanian town of Pennsburg, faces possible life in prison after pleading guilty at a court in Philadelphia on Tuesday to four charges, including conspiracy to murder a foreign target, conspiracy to support terrorists and lying to the FBI.

Ms LaRose, who spent long hours caring for her boyfriend's father, was leading a separate life online from 2008 to 2009. According to prosecutors, Ms LaRose "worked obsessively on her computer to communicate with, recruit and incite other jihadists," using names that included Jihad Jane, SisterOfTerror and ExtremeSister4Life.

Ms LaRose returned to the United States from Sweden, where she had teamed up with a group of conspirators seeking to kill the cartoonist Lars Vilks, in November 2009 and was taken into FBI custody.

She remained in secret custody until March, when her indictment was unsealed hours after Irish authorities swept up an alleged associated terror cell that included another American woman, Jamie Paulin-Ramirez, 32, of Colorado, and her Algerian husband. Ms LaRose had previously denied the allegations.