Nicholas Teausant, 20, of Acampo, California, who spoke of wanting to bomb the Los Angeles subway system was arrested near the Canadian border in Washington state and charged with attempting to travel to Syria to fight alongside Islamic extremists, federal prosecutors said Monday, according to Reuters.

A criminal complaint filed in federal court in Sacramento described him as a student at San Joaquin Delta Community College in Stockton and a member of the National Guard who is being discharged for failing to meet basic academic requirements, Reuters reported.

Beginning last spring, Teausant began expressing on his online photography account a desire to see America's downfall, saying "I would love to join Allah's army but I don't even know how to start," the complaint said, according to Reuters. Later, he took to another online forum to say he hoped to fight in Syria, the document states.

It wasn't immediately clear if Teausant had a lawyer in California, Reuters reported. He was charged with a single count of attempting to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization and agreed during a hearing at U.S. District Court in Seattle to be returned to Sacramento to face the charge.

The complaint said he had discussed numerous other ideas for terrorist activity that never came to fruition, including a plot supposedly hatched during a camping trip with seven other people to bomb the Los Angeles subway system last New Year's Eve or New Year's Day, according to Reuters.

The complaint said he had been planning since October to support the efforts of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, a group that has been fighting in Syria's three-year-old civil war and is designated by the U.S. State Department as a terrorist organization, Reuters reported.

Investigators said Teausant discussed his scheme at length with a person who turned out to be a paid FBI informant, repeatedly affirming that he was serious about it, according to Reuters.

The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant is a breakaway organization from al-Qaida that is considered one of the most brutal groups fighting in Syria's civil war, made up largely of non-Syrian Islamic militants, Reuters reported. It has seized several areas in Syria as it fights the government of President Bashar Assad.

The complaint said Teausant referred to himself as a convert to Islam but did not give details about when or why he may have done so, according to Reuters.

The informant put Teausant in contact with a "mentor" who was actually an undercover federal agent, Reuters reported. Early this month, the "mentor" blessed Teausant's travels, and he boarded a train for Seattle on Sunday night, the complaint said.

When the bus arrived in Blaine, just south of Vancouver, British Columbia, U.S. Customs and Border Protection stopped it and questioned Teausant about where he was headed, according to Reuters. He responded that he was traveling to Vancouver and was arrested, the complaint said.

The maximum penalty for attempting to provide support to a foreign terrorist organization is 15 years in prison and a $250,000 fine, Reuters reported.