Posted on 07/24/2002 10:28:43 PM PDT by Shermy
DETROIT - A man charged with smuggling dlrs 12 million in bogus cashiers checks into the United States told agents the man named on the checks may belong to al-Qaida, authorities said Wednesday.
Omar Shishani, 47, also told investigators during an interview that "if you want to know about terrorism, I can help you with that," Assistant U.S. Attorney Eric Straus said during a hearing.
Defense attorney Nabih Ayad denied his client ever made such statements.
Shishani, who was born in Jordan but is of Chechen descent, was arrested last week after arriving at Detroit Metropolitan Airport on a flight from Indonesia. He was jailed without bond July 17 after pleading innocent to possession of counterfeit securities and smuggling merchandise into the United States. He faces up to 15 years in prison.
Authorities say they found nine phony cashiers checks during a search of Shishani's bags. Six were dated June 10, 2002, and made payable to "Baharuddin Masse," the indictment said. The other checks were dated Sept. 3, Sept. 5 and Sept. 6, 2002.
Authorities also found a piece of paper with Arabic writing that appeared to be verses from the Quran, some of which Straus said were suggestive of "cataclysmic or apocalyptic events."
Shishani told agents he believes Masse may belong to al-Qaida, has made pro- al-Qaida statements and named his daughter al-Qaida, Straus said.
The suspect's attorney said Shishani only said the part about the girl.
Two of the checks were for dlrs 5 million each; two were for dlrs 500,000 each; and five were for dlrs 200,000 each, the affidavit said. The checks, labeled "cashier check," were purportedly issued by the Pomona, California, branch of West America Bank.
There is no Pomona branch of the bank, Secret Service agent Clarence T. Laster said in the affidavit.
Shishani emigrated to the United States in 1979, where he married. He became a U.S. citizen in 1989, his lawyer said. From 1974-1976, Shishani served with the Jordan intelligence service, receiving instruction in spy craft and counter-surveillance techniques, court documents show.
Ayad described Shishani as a broker who went to Indonesia to work on a deal with Masse, also a broker. The deal fell through, Ayad said, and Shishani was instructed to return with the checks.
Shishani didn't know the checks were fraudulent and didn't bring them to Indonesia, Ayad said. He said they originated with a man in California whom Ayad would not identify.
Shishani told federal authorities that he has not closed a deal in four years. Shishani's family in Jordan says Shishani is simply a wealthy computer salesman who has no links to terrorism.
Authorities searched Shishani's home in nearby Dearborn. Straus said several financial documents were seized, including a December 2000 statement indicating Shishani had roughly dlrs 36.5 million, much of that in jewelry and artwork.
His attorney said that the statement is false and that his client is not wealthy. Shishani briefly ran a business in Detroit in the mid-1990s dealing with computers, Ayad said.
Note how the lawyer denies everything. What a worm. Except the girl named "Al Qaida". I guess he suspects that proving the existence of the girl may be easy...so better not lie about that one.
Cashier's checks totalling $12 mill...financial statements totalling $36.5 mill. Even if it's all fraudulent, there's a whole lotta fakin' goin' on...
Wonder if all those cashier's checks were for contributions to the Gray Davis campaign...
But the lawyer is creating quite a story of innocence and lack of intent, ain't he?
Do what?!
Am I supposed to walk away believing that the Jordanians trained this guy and when three years were up....he walked?
I dont think so.
Can you say "sleeper?"
Here's a happy thought from Middle East expert Daniel Pipes:
Islamists constitute a small but significant minority of Muslims, perhaps 10 to 15 per cent of the population. Many of them are peaceable in apearance, but they all must be considered potential killers.
How does 400,000 to 800,000 -- in our country -- potential killers sound?
America's Fifth Column ... watch PBS documentary JIHAD! In America
New Link: Download 8 Mb zip file here (60 minute video)
Anyone have a link to the original story? I want to reread the part where his sister says "Oh nooooo, he couldn't have been supplying computers to Al-Qaeda, he can barely supply them to himself".
Whatever the hell he really sells, he's very good at "supplying himself".
Jewelry and artwork. "I'll take 'Portable Things' for $1000, Alex!"
July 25, 2002
BY CECIL ANGEL, JIM SCHAEFER AND DAVID ASHENFELTER
FREE PRESS STAFF WRITERS
After his arrest at Metro Airport for allegedly carrying $12 million in bogus cashier's checks into the country, the Dearborn man sat down with federal agents and started talking.
| 'THEN WE DESTROY THEM' |
| Federal authorities say they found a piece of paper with ominous phrases, written in Arabic, when they arrested a Dearborn man July 17 at Metro Airport while he was carrying $12 million in phony cashier's checks. Prosecutors say the checks were made out to a man who may have ties to the Al Qaeda terrorist network. Following are excerpts from a translation filed Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Detroit. "When we decide to destroy a population, we (first) send a definite order to those among them who are given the good things of this life and yet transgress; so that the word is proved true against them: Then we destroy them utterly. "There is not a population but we shall destroy it before the day of judgment or punish it with a dreadful penalty. That is written in the eternal record." "Mighty indeed were the plots which they made, but their plots were (well) within sight of God, even though they were such as to shake the hills." |
That his family was close to the Jordanian king and his army.
That his brother commanded special forces there.
And then, prosecutors say, there was this:
"If you want to know about terrorism, I can help you with that."
In recounting the statements in court documents, government prosecutors sought Wednesday to show that Omar Abdel-Fatah Al-Shishani is a mystery man who must remain jailed while investigators determine whether the checks were linked to Al Qaeda, the terrorist network blamed in the Sept. 11 attacks.
He lives in a modest home, yet agents who raided the house found a sheet claiming his net worth to be more than $30 million.
On Wednesday, U.S. Magistrate Thomas Carlson agreed to the government's request and ordered the 47-year-old man, also known as Omar Shishani, held without bond, based in part on the government's account of the agents' interview with him after the arrest July 17.
Carlson said there is sufficient evidence to link Shishani to potential terrorist activity. Shishani was indicted Tuesday on charges of possession of counterfeit securities and smuggling merchandise into the United States.
After court, Shishani's lawyer, Nabih Ayad, said he would appeal today and hopes to have a hearing scheduled next week so Shishani can be released.
"For them to use this against him is just a way to blow a lot of smoke in the court and keep this person detained," he said. Shishani has pleaded not guilty.
The government side presented in court included an assertion that the man to whom the checks were written, Indonesian businessman Baharuddin Masse, may be a member of Al Qaeda.
Shishani allegedly told agents Baharuddin Masse has made statements favoring Al Qaeda and named his daughter Al Qaeda.
When arrested after a flight from Indonesia, Shishani was carrying a piece of paper with Arabic verses from the Koran that appeared, in translation, to refer to martyrs and apocalyptic events, the FBI said.
In a raid July 18 on Shishani's Dearborn home, agents said they found a document that claimed his personal worth in 2000 was more than $36 million.
Besides millions in cash, jewelry and property, the document claimed he owns art worth $27 million, including a jade tray from the Chinese Ming Dynasty. Court documents do not indicate whether agents believe the claims.
Nobody answered the door Wednesday at Shishani's two-story brick and white paneled house on Chovin Street.
In his argument for denying Shishani bond, assistant U.S. attorney Eric Straus said that Shishani is well traveled and not a U.S. native, and has access to large amounts of money.
He is "quite possibly a danger to the community," Straus said.
Of the items of evidence gathered since the arrest, Straus said, "What they suggest is somewhat alarming."
On the piece of paper Shishani was carrying with him from Indonesia was this in Arabic:
"When we decide to destroy a population, we (first) send a definite order to those among them who are given the good things of this life and yet transgress; so that the word is proved true against them: Then we destroy them utterly," according to an FBI translation.
In denying bond, Carlson said he was concerned about taking the terrorism suspicions at face value.
"Obviously since Sept. 11, a lot of things have changed," he said, adding that it was important that the courts ensure that there is not an "irrational or unjustified backlash against our Arabic brothers and sisters."
According to court records, when federal agents interviewed Shishani on July 17, he said he served with the Jordan Intelligence Service in 1974-76. He received instruction in spy craft and countersurveillance techniques, he claimed.
He also said his brother, Ahmed Ali El-Din, was commander of Jordanian Special Forces, the government said.
Abdallah Shishani, Omar Shishani's brother, said that before the arrest his brother had been in Indonesia drumming up cell phone business for an American telephone company.
Omar Shishani also had been acting as a mediator for a Texas company wanting to buy Libyan oil despite a U.S. embargo, Abdallah Shishani said.
Shiho Kusumoto, Omar Shishani's wife, was suspended from her job at Northwest Airlines following her husband's arrest, attorney Ayad said.
Northwest spokeswoman Mary Beth Schubert confirmed that Kusumoto is an employee of the airline and works with ground operations. She couldn't comment on Kusumoto's employment because of company policy.
Omar Shishani came to the attention of federal officials during a routine customs inspection, according to court records.
According to the criminal complaint, Victoria Brown, an inspector with the U.S. Customs Service in Detroit, noticed nine checks purportedly issued by the Pomona, Calif., branch of West America Bank in Shishani's baggage. Two checks were for $500,000 each, two others were for $5 million each, and five were for $200,000 each. Six checks were posted for June 2002. The other three had September dates.
All the checks had "Cashier Check;" none said "Official Check." A fraud investigator at West America Bank confirmed the checks were bogus.
A Secret Service official in Washington said last week that the checks Shishani was carrying are similar to four checks totaling $800,000 that a group of men tried to pass in June at the MGM Grand Hotel in Las Vegas. Those four also were drawn on a fictitious, Pomona branch of West America Bank.
Las Vegas police said they were tipped off to the plan, arranged meetings with the alleged ringleaders, and on June 13 arrested 10 men of various nationalities when the men tried to pass the checks. Several of the men had fake identification.
Seven men in that case were charged in federal court with possession of a counterfeit security and are facing trial Aug. 20. One of the seven has disappeared. It's unclear what happened to the other three.
The FBI in Las Vegas said it's unclear whether any of the men had terror links. Five of the Sept. 11 hijackers had met with people in Las Vegas before the attacks.
"The Secret Service is examining the case for any links to terrorism," said Natalie Collins, spokeswoman for the U.S. Attorney's Office in Las Vegas.
Ayad said Shishani doesn't have any terrorist links and didn't even know the checks were counterfeit until he was arrested.
It all started about two months ago when Shishani was contacted by an acquaintance in California who wanted him to help a Texas woman get financing for a business enterprise, Ayad said.
Shishani said Baharuddin Masse had connections to banks in Indonesia and could get the money, Ayad said. The California man traveled with Shishani several times to Indonesia to meet with Baharuddin Masse.
They were supposedly close to a deal and the California man sent checks to Baharuddin Masse, who was to deposit them in a bank account as a down payment for the loan. The deal fell through, Ayad said. The California man instructed Shishani, who was in Indonesia, to return to the United States with the checks.
Contact CECIL ANGEL at 313-223-4531 or angel@freepress.com. Staff writer Niraj Warikoo contributed to this report.
I'll bet that they/we have a lot more on this guy than is known publically. Also, yesterdays report said that he had seven brothers in this country.
Isn't it a concidence that his wife works for an airlines ground crew, mention of spying, large amounts of cash, older middle eastern male and he apparently does not do anything for income. We have ourselves a big guy and I expect he has been under watch for some time.
And accordingly, was recruited by the Jordanians just a few years after King Hussein's September 1970 campaign against the PLO immigrant squatters in his country, resulting in the *Black September* war between Hussein's loyal Bedouin's and Army and the PLO insurgents, resulting in around 3500 killed...about the number of casualties on 09/11. Hmmmm....
Omar Shishani, 47, shown in a United States Marshals Service mugshot in Detroit, Thursday, July 18, 2002. Shishani, who was arrested Wednesday, July 17 after arriving to Detroit on a flight from Indonesia and charged with possessing fraudulent bank notes.
General Erik K. Shinseki, who assumed duties as the 34th Chief of Staff, United States Army, on 22 June 1999.
Shouldn't have any trouble *getting to first base* with her, in'ch Allah....
-archy-/-
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.