Posted on 10/18/2005 1:06:44 PM PDT by LesbianThespianGymnasticMidget
Portions of I-95 briefly shut down on concerns over suspected terrorist plot; Uncorroborated information said to come from source abroad
Federal authorities are detaining at least one man of Egyptian origin who worked at a Middle Eastern market in Baltimore in connection with a threat that closed Interstate 95 and the Harbor and Fort McHenry tunnels after concern over a suspected terrorist plot to blow up one of the tunnels.
The shutdown caused gridlock throughout the metropolitan region as police and federal agents investigated the threat.
(Excerpt) Read more at newsday.com ...
BALTIMORE -- Federal authorities began questioning a Baltimore storeowner at the same time police closed the Fort McHenry Tunnel and portions of the Harbor Tunnel.The Maryland Transportation Authority completely shut down the Harbor Tunnel in both directions in addition to closing two of four tubes in the Fort McHenry Tunnel. This came as a specific security precaution based on information authorities received the past couple days.
Officers stopped some vehicles at the Fort McHenry Tunnel toll plaza, checking their contents. The MdTA reopened the tunnels shortly after 2 p.m.
WBAL-TV 11 News I-Team lead investigative reporter Jayne Miller reported that sources said information about the threat came from an overseas informant who's known to have a good track record, though the credibility of this specific threat was questionable.
Baltimore Special Agent in Charge Kevin Perkins said authorities have conducted interviews of people in throughout Baltimore City, but he could not comment further.
"The closure of the tunnel was just one specific aspect, there were many other investigations going on," Perkins said.
Miller reported that FBI officials have tracked down certain individuals throughout Baltimore for questioning in an effort to determine the credibility of the information. The 11 News I-Team has learned that federal authorities have taken four people into custody for questioning, based on immigration concerns.
"I cannot comment as to anyone being taken into custody or any particular nationality," Perkins said.
WBAL-TV 11 News reporter David Collins reported that the FBI is questioning Majed Hussein, an Egyptian, who owns the KOKO Market in the 6000 block of Eastern Avenue in Baltimore's Highlandtown neighborhood.
According to neighbors of the store, the FBI arrived at about 11:30 a.m., and three hours later, they left with Hussein and a brown paper bag. The Baltimore Sun reported he is being questioned in connection with a threat that involved the Baltimore tunnels.
Collins said the KOKO Market has been a fixture in this neighborhood for several years, offering international money transfers, MoneyGrams and lottery tickets.
Many neighbors said they are surprised that the FBI appeared to be interested in Hussein, known to many people simply as "Mike."
"He's a very nice guy, I've known him for so many years," said Fiikry Boykien, a neighbor.
"I've known him a long time, I never had any problems with him," said Samah Elbek, a neighbor.
Sources told the 11 News I-Team that the information came from an informant overseas who passed on word to U.S. officials of a possible threat involving a bomb and Baltimore's tunnels. Sources said the information received from overseas included the names of certain people.
WBAL-TV 11 News reporter Lisa Robinson said officials called the credibility of the information "undetermined."
Perkins said the information was "about an unspecified tunnel in the Baltimore area" and that it was somewhat specific in reference to date and time.
"At this point, no evidence collected to date has corroborated the information," Perkins said.
Collins reported that members of the FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force, which includes Baltimore City police officials, responded to the store in east Baltimore. Witness described seeing the FBI surrounding the building and asking residents whether a back door to the store existed.
The international money transfers is troubling. Evidence carried away in a brown paper bag indicates that Hussein packed material in that bag and that it may have been as small as receipts. The plot thickens.
Whether that guy was polygraphed remains to be seen. Looks like, so far, the nexus is Egyptian and Dutch so far.
Depends of course on the bomb, but, here's a couple of links to articles related to fires in tunnels over here:
Now, imagine that a powerful bomb where to explode in the middle of the tunnel ...
"The MSM was telling us that the Feds were saying that the warning wasn't credible."
Hopefully, this is a misdirection and the Feds are rolling them up as we speak?
I wonder, do the "moderate" muslims who refuse to work with the government have any clue what will happen to them in this nation if a real mass kill happens, lets say 100,000+ or if terrorism becomes a daily thing? I think they're in deep denial about the upcoming game of Cowboys and Muslims.
Mikulski would probably melt like the wicked witch of the west if her PC came within 10 hops of this site!!
Maybe thats what they were looking for - Bab's in a Ryder Truck with a PC linked to FR!! = Instant thermonuclear meltdown in Baltimore harbor!
BUMP
Early Monday morning, while most of the city slept, Maryland Transportation Authority Police quietly conducted a test: They shut down and then quickly re-opened the tunnels that carry traffic under the harbor.The operation was one of a series of preparatory steps taken by dozens of law enforcement officials behind the scenes over the past week. Their work culminated yesterday when 80 MdTA officers virtually shut down the Harbor and Fort McHenry tunnels while a task force of federal investigators searched several businesses in the area.
(SNIP)
McLhinney made the decision to secure the tunnels about 11:30 a.m., after he learned that federal investigators had begun executing their searches and interviewing people to assess the threat, said Kevin Perkins, the FBI special agent in charge of the Baltimore field office.
Authorities feared that if terrorists were planning a strike, the searches might prompt them to launch the attacks. The businesses that were searched were all within a few miles of the tunnels.
(SNIP)
Richard Knott, a friend of the store's owner, Maged Hussein, said he wandered into the business, a convenience store [Koko's Market] that specializes in Middle Eastern products, and was ordered to leave by a man who identified himself as being with the FBI and who then locked the front door.
"FBI told me to get out, the store is closed," said Knott, who lives in the neighborhood. "They went in the store and threw a 'Closed' sign on the door."
The authorities were there for at least two hours and put Hussein in an unmarked car, one of four that the authorities had parked in an alley behind the building, said Ed Andrews, who lives in a home on Dundalk Avenue that sits beside the alley.
Hussein was apparently brought in for questioning, but he was not of one four men held on immigration violations in connection with the federal investigation. It was not clear late last night if he was still being held.
The authorities also visited Didi's Pizzeria restaurants in Essex and Dundalk. A man identifying himself as the manager of the Dundalk store said FBI agents showed up about noon, ordered that it be locked and spent several hours asking detailed questions about the employees. The man said the agents did not say why they were at the store.
(SNIP)
[Didi's landlord] Wayland, 80, said she talked to Madhat Mohomed Sharalla, one of two men on the shop's lease, last month. He told her he had to go to Egypt for three months, she said.
Some new information.
Wednesday, October 19, 2005 - WBAL Radio and The Associated Press
Federal officials are moving forward with the deportation of four men who were detained on immigration charges as part of an investigation into a potential terrorism threat in a Baltimore highway tunnel, a federal official said Wednesday.
Mark Bastan, acting special agent in charge at the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Baltimore, said the four already were going to be deported and had broken the law by failing to show up for deportation proceedings before they were detained on Tuesday.
"Technically, they were fugitives," Bastan said. "Their deportations are just being acted on."
The four were identified as Ahmad Al Momani, 58, Mohamed Ahmed Mohamady Ismail, 30, Mohamed Mohamed-Abdelhamed, 38, and Suied Mohamad-Ahamad, 25. Ahmad Al Momani is from Jordan, and the other men are from Egypt, Bastan said.
Authorities received a tip about Ismail from a source who is in custody in the Netherlands.
Bastan said all four men had previous orders for deportation for separate reasons.
"It was not something they were involved in together," he said.
The men were to be held at a detention center in Wicomico County on Maryland's Eastern Shore. Deportation procedures could take up to about a month, Bastan said.
Meanwhile, the FBI planned to continue the investigation that led to the closure of one of two highway tunnels under Baltimore's harbor for nearly two hours Tuesday and partially shut the other because of an unconfirmed threat to detonate vehicles full of explosives inside them.
The Baltimore Harbor Tunnel was closed and the Fort McHenry Tunnel was reduced to one lane of traffic in each direction. The closures began about 11:30 a.m. and officers began reopening the tubes about 1:15 p.m.
The Baltimore FBI's Joint Terrorism Task Force was heading the probe into the threat.
"The task force will continuing following up leads and make a decision about how much further to develop it," said Barry Maddox, a spokesman with the FBI's Baltimore field office.
One federal law enforcement official said the decision to close the tunnel was linked to raids carried out on Tuesday in Baltimore. Authorities were seeking several men who the source of the threat information said would drive vehicles filled with explosives through a Baltimore-area tunnel. The threat information was shared last week, but the official said local authorities felt they needed to shut down the tunnels around the time of the raids on the chance that, assuming the threat was real, the raids would force the bombers' hand.
The official, who spoke on condition he not be named because the investigation is ongoing, also denied that the source failed a lie detector test. The FBI said Tuesday it had been unable to corroborate the threat, calling it of undetermined credibility.
At Safa's Pizza in Dundalk, manager Ahmed Khader, an Egyptian native, said FBI agents and other authorities raided the business Tuesday and took into custody another Egyptian man, who was not an employee.
"He came to visit us - bad luck," Khader said.
Didi's Pizzeria in Essex, where authorities also searched Tuesday, was closed.
Matt Schussler, a part-owner of Little Lou's Seafood and Subs, two doors down from Didi's, said the owners of Didi's were Egyptian and that they had abruptly closed up shop on Saturday. He said a half-dozen FBI agents arrived Tuesday and questioned him about what the Didi's employees looked like and what kind of vehicles they drove.
"It was just odd because these guys happened to stop coming into work two or three days ahead of time," Schussler said. "I don't know if it was a coincidence." ---
Sounds like the local authorites had their stuff together and that they did the right thing.
Good on them.
The tunnel bomb scare turned out just to be Mikulski and
a few friends from Washington lighting farts in her car.
Exactly- but as I surfed last night..I heard the ever brilliant Kieth Olberman claiming that Baltimore and the NYC subway threat were all DELIBERATELY put out to take attention off..yawn..Miers...Flamegate...DeLay..
Ping!
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