What happened to the Mayfield Story? (Please forgive this breach of posting etiquette)

Shameless Non-Article posting | 5-11-2004 | Codeflier

[Codeflier]

What happened to the huge story that broke last week regarding the Attorney named Mayfield that had fingerprints found in Madrid related to the bombing there in March?

It just seems to have totally died. Anyone know what is up with this?

[Codeflier]

Is there a massive effort in the media to hide this story because the guy is a democrat? Or did the FBI or CIA ask the media to back off because it would interfere with an ongoing investigation? Any info would be appreciated.

[nuconvert]

They talked about it yesterday. I think the FBI and the Italians are still verifying the fingerprints. There seems to be some difference of opinion.

[FreedomCalls]

It doesn't fuel an anti-Bush agenda. Any news that cannot paint the President in a bad light is currently under a national embargo until after the election.

[Rokurota]

I didn't follow the story closely, but since we're asking questions:

How did they trace his fingerprint? What was his fingerprint on file for?

[Redcoat LI]

He has the benefit of due process,it would not be fair to draw too much attention to him.

Contrast his case with the M.P.'s who have already been convicted as war criminals by the Senate RATpack and their paramours in the press.

[kellynla]

U.S. Lawyer Is Arrested in Madrid Bombing Inquiry
By SARAH KERSHAW and ERIC LICHTBLAU
N.Y. TIMES MAY 6, 2004

PORTLAND, Ore., May 6 — An Oregon lawyer was taken into custody by the F.B.I. on Thursday on a material witness warrant in connection with the deadly railway bombings in Madrid on March 11, a government official said.

The lawyer, Brandon Mayfield, was the first person in the United States to be drawn into the investigation of the Madrid bombings, which killed 191 people and which Spanish officials have linked to possible associates of Al Qaeda.

The F.B.I. executed a search warrant on Mr. Mayfield's home in the Portland area and a second one at his law office, said the government official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. Officials would not say what agents were searching for or what led them to Mr. Mayfield.

"All I can say is we served two search warrants," said Beth Anne Steele, a spokeswoman for the F.B.I. in Portland. She declined further comment.

Mr. Mayfield's mother and his former step-mother, who both live in Kansas where Mr. Mayfield was raised, were questioned Thursday by F.B.I. agents, the former step-mother, Ruth Alexander, said. Ms. Alexander said she had helped raise him from the age of 12.

Both of the women were stunned, said Ms. Alexander, who said she had learned about Mr. Mayfield's arrest when F.B.I. agents arrived at the auto repair shop where she works as an officer manager in Halstead, Kan.

"This somehow has to be some kind of a mistake," Ms. Alexander said in a telephone interview. "I think they're grasping at straws to try and nail people for some of these crimes. And no one, no one, can imagine that he would have anything intentionally to do with anything."

Outside the Mayfields' home in the Portland suburb of Aloha, his wife, Mona Mayfield, gave a brief statement to reporters. "I know he is innocent," she told KGW, a Northwest cable news station. "Everyone knows he's innocent."

Few details emerged Thursday night about Mr. Mayfield's case.

A government official said: "We don't know how strong the case is, and the information is very limited. It's a very active investigation at this point."

Officials confirmed Thursday night, however, that Mr. Mayfield's fingerprints matched prints found on a bag in the wreckage of the Madrid bombing.

Mr. Mayfield, an American citizen who converted to Islam, has a link to one of the six defendants in a highly publicized case in Portland who were convicted of conspiring to aid the Taliban and Al Qaeda.

He represented one of the most prominent defendants, Jeffrey Leon Battle, in a custody case involving Mr. Battle's son, a lawyer for another defendant said. Mr. Mayfield did not represent him in the criminal case.

But government officials said it had not yet been determined whether his connection to Mr. Battle had anything to do with his arrest in the Madrid investigation.

The news of the arrest was first reported by Newsweek.

The use of a material witness warrant suggested that authorities were still building their case against Mr. Mayfield, 37. The Justice Department has used the warrants with increasing frequency since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks to indefinitely incarcerate dozens of people who the authorities say may have had information relevant to an investigation. Some civil rights advocates have attacked the practice, saying it has been abused.

Mr. Mayfield, who joined the Army after high school, partly to pay for his college tuition and, later, law school, Ms. Alexander said, served at Fort Lewism, Wash., where he met his wife, an Egyptian. He passed the bar in Portland in 2000. He ran his own business, with his wife working as the secretary, Ms. Alexander said, and was "struggling" to support three children, between the ages of 10 and 15, on the income from a start-up law firm.

Ms. Alexander said that Mr. Mayfield had converted to Islam in the 1980's, around the time that he met his wife, but that he was far from a "radical Muslim."

"It was just a go-to-church-on-Sunday type religion for him," she said. "The only difference I ever saw was that he couldn't eat pork and they didn't celebrate Christmas."

The couple married in Las Vegas she said, while Ms. Alexander watched their new baby in Kansas.

Now, Ms. Alexander said Mr. Mayfield's family "doesn't even know where he is."

Eighteen people have been charged so far in Spain — six with mass murder and the others with collaboration or belonging to a terrorist organization. The F.B.I. and other federal agencies have warned that Al Qaeda or its sympathizers might try to attack mass transit systems in major cities in the United States this summer.

A seventh person in the Portland terrorism case, Maher Hawash, was taken into custody a year ago as a material witness and was later charged and convicted of conspiring to aid the Taliban. He was sentenced to seven years in prison in February.

Mr. Mayfield is listed in the University of Oregon's directory of immigration lawyers. Court records show he has argued custody cases before the Oregon appellate court.

Last night in Beaverton, a suburb of Portland, a small office on Canyon Lane with Mr. Mayfield's name on the door was dark. Two lawyers from the law firm next door said they did not know Mr. Mayfield.

"You'd think a new attorney would want to come over and chat, but we never heard from him," one of the lawyers, Michael Baxter, said

[Libertarianize the GOP]

Grand jury to consider case against PDX lawyer jailed in Madrid bombing

KGW 8 ^ | May 11, 2004 | KGW and AP Staff

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1133516/posts

[baltodog]

The guy is a Kansan.

It's all over the news here.

There seems to be some dispute over the fingerprints...Spain says they don't belong to him.

He's just another poor muslim affected by the Patriot Act.

[kellynla]

Oregon law enforcement officials have admitted they may have moved prematurely with the arrest of Brandon Mayfield, but were forced to do so because of leaks to the media.

The suspect is a former Lieutenant in the US Army, who has acted in the defence of people with suspected El Que'da links:

Mr. Mayfield, who is an American citizen, has a link to one of the six defendants in a highly publicized case in Portland who were convicted of conspiring to aid the Taliban and Al Qaeda. He represented one defendant, Jeffrey Leon Battle, in a custody case involving Mr. Battle's son. Mr. Mayfield did not represent Mr. Battle in the criminal case.

Only a few weeks ago, AvNell Mayfield said, Mr. Mayfield was telling her how upset he was by the case of Capt. James Yee, a Muslim Army chaplain who had been accused of espionage before charges were dropped. Captain Yee and Mr. Mayfield had both been stationed at Fort Lewis in Washington State and had crossed paths while stationed in Germany, she said.

"He thought that was so unfair, that our government could ruin a person like that and no public apologies were made," Mrs. Mayfield, a seventh-grade art teacher, said. "I never thought it would happen to my family."

The case against Mayfield is based on one of his dabs being uncovered on a plastic bag found among forensic evidence connected with the Madrid bombing:

Spanish officials said on Friday that American investigators had apparently matched Mr. Mayfield's fingerprints to a single print on a plastic bag recovered from a stolen van used by the bombers. The bag, which held seven copper detonators like those used on the train bombs, was found at a suburban Madrid train station hours after the bombings.

A senior Spanish counterterrorism official said that investigators from Spain and the United States differed on whether the fingerprint on the bag conclusively matched those of Mr. Mayfield, who was identified to the Spaniards only as a military veteran who had converted to Islam. Though a Spanish police report described the forensic evidence as a match, the official said, F.B.I. officials had raised some questions.

It is not known if there is any other evidence held besides the forensic that has been disclosed

[Steven W.]

that's not entirely accurate. There are three different reports coming out of Spain: 1) is that there was a strong match with his fingerprints and the likelihood that somebody with close ties to AlQaeda operatives, as the suspect has been previously & publicly known to have engaged, is highly suspect in of itself given the odds against such a connection if merely pure circumstance. 2) is that there was an 8 point match on the fingerprints, close enough that the match identified him as the only person in the world so close but other uncertainties remain. 3) the story orginating out of the leftist press in Spain & cojoined by sympathizers here in the US that the guy is a poor muslim, admittedly supportive of AlQaeda types in prior circumstances, but is obviously innocent of such dastardly deeds and another purported liberal victim of the Patriot Act. US authorities have not commented nor contributed much, if anything, further.

[Ready4Freddy]

He's ex-Army as well as a member of the Washington State(at least) Bar. His prints would be on file from both of those.

Word has it that it's a partial print that would cause some problems being verified as a match.

How did they trace his fingerprint? What was his fingerprint on file for?

[Ready4Freddy]

Got a link to that article, kellynia?

[kellynla]

I think the cops screwed up...
Seems that Mayfield hasn't been out of the country in ten years...

http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2004/05/09/2003154754/print

[kellynla]

which one?

[Ready4Freddy]

Bear in mind that he's being held on a material witness warrant, the use of which was somewhat unusual prior to 9/11. MWW's are not public info, so it wouldn't necessarily be suspect that not much info is forthcoming.

[Ready4Freddy]

The one you qouted in the post I responded to, #9, I believe.

[kellynla]

k give me a sec...

[Ready4Freddy]

Thanks, was wondering when it was published, and where (use of the 'c' in 'defence', and the term 'dabs' suggest it's Canadian, perhaps.

[kellynla]

here ya go

http://www.gravett.org/pc/archives/017389.html

[garjog]

The suspect claims that he has never traveled to Spain, but we know that the terrorist produce fake passports. I read in FrontPage Magazine that Atta could have entered Prague using such fake passports:
"Epstein also explains how Atta could have traveled to Prague at that time without the Czechs having a record of such a trip. Spanish intelligence has found evidence that two Algerians provided Atta a false passport." http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Printable.asp?ID=13323

The fact that poor Brandon is associated with convicted terrorists caught planning to kill Americans doesn't help his case.