"Daniel Ngwepe, a political counselor for the South African Embassy in Washington, told the newspaper that the three were detained on charges of being in the United States illegally after Ahmed had telephone conversations with them from her prison cell. "
Darwin at work...I am an illegal alien, therefore I call other illegal aliens from my prison cell while in jail for illegal entry with an arab name and travel record.....
The way this sentence is worded it sounds to me like they were watching closely and monitored her phone call after she was in custody. The arrests came when they relayed the info to the local New Yawk authorities.
Let'em all cool their heels in Gitmo for a couple of decades.