Posted on 06/16/2005 4:26:15 PM PDT by NormsRevenge
SACRAMENTO (AP) - A father and son from Lodi were indicted Thursday by a federal grand jury on charges that they lied to authorities investigating links to Pakistani terrorist training camps connected to al-Qaida.
Hamid Hayat, 22, allegedly lied to the FBI earlier this month when he said he did not attend a terrorism camp in Pakistan last year and in 2003, prosecutors said. He was charged with two counts of lying to the FBI. His father, Umer Hayat, 47, was charged with a single count of lying to investigators when he denied that his son had attended such camps. The FBI said the elder Hayat later admitted to flying his son to Pakistan and paying for the camp, which was run by the friend of a relative.
The indictment said the younger Hayat falsely told authorities he was not involved with a terrorist organization, that he never attended a terrorist camp and that he had never received any weapons training at such a camp.
"In truth and in fact as he then well knew, he had attended one or more jihadist terrorist training camps, which included weapons training, in Pakistan," one indictment said.
In an affidavit, the FBI said Hamid Hayat attended a terror camp for about six months before returning to the U.S. intending to wage attacks. They said they found no immediate threat or terrorist activity.
The Hayats, both U.S. citizens, previously pleaded not guilty and are being held without bail in Sacramento County Jail. They are scheduled to appear in court Tuesday.
Relatives have said that Hamid Hayat returned to his father's homeland to get married, remained in the village the whole time and cared about little more than cricket matches. The Pakistan government has denied that terrorists run camps in the country.
Hamid Hayat's lawyer said she was not surprised by the indictments but said her client was innocent.
"My client is not a terrorist," lawyer Wazhma Mojaddidi said in a statement. "He does not associate with any terrorist organizations or support any terrorist activities, and he has most definitely never attended a terrorist training camp."
Earlier this week, Hamid Hayat's grandfather in Pakistan denied the allegations.
Qari Saeed-ur Rehman, leader of the Jamia Islamia madrassah in Rawalpindi, told The Associated Press that there is no training camp in the city and that his grandson never received jihadist training.
The allegations against Hamid Hayat, he said, were a "pack of lies."
The FBI spent several years investigating possible links to terrorism in Lodi, an agricultural town of about 62,000 about 30 miles south of Sacramento.
Lodi's city manager and police chief have said they're concerned the town has been portrayed as harboring a terrorist cell.
After the Hayats were arrested and three Pakistani citizens, including two Muslim leaders, were detained on immigration complaints, members of the 2,000-member Pakistani community in Lodi said they were unfairly targeted.
On Thursday, two groups held a news conference outside the federal courthouse and said they would file complaints with the FBI and U.S. attorney's office that Muslims were harassed by authorities.
"We have documented numerous reports of intimidating tactics used recently by some FBI agents," said Basim Elkarra, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations. "We've become disappointed and alarmed at reports of abuse by local FBI."
Meanwhile, the American Civil Liberties Union and the San Francisco-based Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights filed a federal Freedom of Information Act request seeking the policies and procedures the FBI used during surveillance and interviews with Lodi Muslims.
"People have been told that if they didn't immediately comply (with an interview request), that they would be watched constantly, surveilled all the time, to the point where they would be arrested for the smallest crimes, like ... jaywalking," said Shirin Sinnar, an attorney with the committee.
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Editor's note: Associated Press Writer Jennifer Coleman contributed to this report.
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On the Net:
U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of California: http://www.usdoj.gov/usao/cae/home/
Dick the Dick Durbin will fly out to save these poor innocent Jihadists who only want to kill our families, friends and us.
"I never had sex with *that* woman."
ping
In other news Satan was arrested today at great cost and charged with making human being's lives miserable by causing murder, hatred and other mahem. The American Civil Liberties Union and the San Francisco-based Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights filed a federal Freedom of Information Act to find out what kind of surveillance was used in Satan's sovereign country, Hell.
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