NEW YORK — The self-proclaimed jihadist accused in a New Year’s Eve machete attack on two NYPD officers spent his summer wielding a weed whacker.
Neighbors of terror suspect Trevor Bickford recalled the resident of small-town Wells, Maine, as a former junior high school football player working at a local golf course a few months earlier, with no signs of radicalization or hints of the Times Square carnage ahead. He was a member of the grounds crew at the Old Marsh County Club, trimming the grass and raking the sand traps in the sunshine.
“Very polite, soft-spoken,” a 57-year-old local resident told the Daily News. “He carried himself well. He was respectful, polite. Not arrogant in any way. He said thank you. You’d never know. Just totally shocked. ... What was going on in his life? You’re trying to put your head around it.”
