Arrested Men's Shaved Bodies Drew Suspicion of the F.B.I.

The New York Times ^ | October 26, 2001 | CHRISTOPHER DREW and RALPH BLUMENTHAL

[sarcasm]

	Ayub Ali Khan, left, and Mohammed Jaweed Azmath were taken off a train in Texas on Sept. 12.

hen two Indian men were arrested in Texas the day after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the F.B.I. found that both had shaved most of the hair on their bodies.

The Federal Bureau of Investigations interpreted the closely cut hair, and otherwise shaven bodies, as a possible sign that the men, Ayub Ali Khan and Mohammed Jaweed Azmath, might have been ready to die in a similar attack, and were "prepared to meet Allah," one bureau official said.

This created suspicions, still unconfirmed, that the men, who carried box cutters and $5,500 in cash, might have been part of a failed hijacking team, officials said.

The F.B.I.'s concerns about Mr. Khan and Mr. Azmath, who had flown out of Newark on the morning of the hijackings, grew after agents recovered letters instructing some of the suspected hijackers to "shave excess hair from the body" as they prepared for the suicide missions, the officials said.

Mr. Khan and Mr. Azmath were "extremely nervous" when police officers approached them on a train in Fort Worth, according to an arrest report released yesterday by the Fort Worth police. The report also revealed that Mr. Azmath was carrying a pocket knife and that the men's luggage contained receipts showing that they had recently received transfers of money.

One Muslim leader said yesterday that shaving one's body was not a common practice in his religion. Nihad Awad, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, an Islamic advocacy organization based in Washington, said pilgrims to Mecca sometimes cut their hair short or shaved their scalps but not their entire bodies.

"Nothing in the Koran or the teachings of the Prophet talks of this," he said. "It really makes no sense." He said it might be explainable only by "the mentality of cult."

F.B.I. officials said they initially suspected that Mr. Khan and Mr. Azmath could have been part of a team meant to hijack the plane they took from Newark, Trans World Airlines Flight 679, or another airliner. But they said they did not find any other passengers on the T.W.A. flight that resembled the profiles of the suspected hijackers.

Neither Mr. Khan, 34, nor Mr. Azmath, 32, has been charged with any crime in connection with the terrorist plots, and no proof has emerged that either man even knew any of the suspected hijackers.

Both men are being held in jail in New York as material witnesses in the investigation, although authorities said they had not provided much cooperation.

When the two were taken off the train in Fort Worth on Sept. 12, they told police officers they were headed for San Antonio to visit a friend and start a fruit stand.

The report said Mr. Azmath quickly denied any role in the terrorist attacks, saying, "I did not have anything to do with New York."

But the report, prepared by a Fort Worth police sergeant, Brad S. Johnson, ticked off several other reasons why the men, who boarded the train in St. Louis after their flight was grounded, seemed suspicious.

The report said the police officers, who were working on an antidrug task force, were interested in the men because they had bought their tickets at the last minute with cash, a practice common among drug couriers. Both men were asleep when the train arrived in Fort Worth, Sergeant Johnson noted. Once the police awakened them, an artery on Mr. Azmath's neck began "visibly pulsating" and his forehead got sweaty, while Mr. Kahn's hands trembled, the report said.

It also said the men had receipts showing that they had received money transfers, although the officials would not say who had sent the money or how much was involved.

Mr. Azmath told the officers that he earned only $300 a week at a newsstand in Newark where he and Mr. Khan had worked until late August.

Two boxcutters and $2,400 of the cash were in a new black briefcase with a combination lock that belonged to Mr. Kahn. In addition to the pocket knife, the report said, Mr. Azmath carried nearly $3,200 in cash and photocopies of multiple passports depicting him in various guises: with a full beard; a mustache; and clean shaven, both with and without glasses. Yet, the report said, Mr. Azmath answered "no" when asked if he was carrying knives or a large amount of money.

In an interview yesterday, Sergeant Johnson said that immigration agents detained the men over the validity of their passports.

Since then, the F.B.I. has also been examining how Mr. Khan and Mr. Azmath amassed $64,000 to send home to relatives in their native India in 1999, especially given Mr. Azmath's statement that he had earned only $300 a week.

Late last week, federal prosecutors charged Mohammad Aslam Pervez, a third man who had shared a Jersey City apartment with Mr. Khan and Mr. Azmath, with lying about more than $100,000 that had flowed in and out of his bank account.

Richard L. Gruber, a lawyer for the newsstand company, said most of Mr. Pervez's checks and money orders were related to his attempts to buy part of that business.

The F.B.I. also recently tested the Jersey City apartment for signs of anthrax, and its agents have looked into a tip that Mr. Azmath may have been seen in 1993, around the time of the van-bombing of the World Trade Center, in an apartment with a man who was later convicted in the assault. But officials said they doubted that Mr. Azmath had any connection to that attack.

[rolling_stone]

I agree he does look like john doe # 2 frontal sketch and if he was in the us at the time of the OKC bombing.... can someone match up the pics like was done on another thread?

[dagnabit]

It's about Gary being a potentail highjacker because he is prepared to meet Allah.

[Silly]

I'm curious: Did the men shave each other before the attacks? I've heard about bonding, but this shaving business sounds kinky to me.

[syriacus]

Thanks for putting the pictures side by side.

Same 'pug' nose or space between the nose and lips. Eyebrows in both pictures have arching in same area, and cross the nasal bridge to the same area. Same short neck (or high back of the shoulders). Same full lower lip. Jaw line is a little different. Hairline might be receding a bit.

[samtheman]

Thanks for putting the pictures side by side.

That way we get all the barfing over at once. It makes me sick to my stomach to look at all the El Creepo pictures of these Arab Scumbags. Bin Laden worst of all.

[America's Resolve]

Thanks for the flag PD.

I've slowly over years and rapidly since 911 developed a problem with at least half of Islam, but this has me scratching my head.

Kinky? From what I've heard/read, their sexually repressed if anything, not free-wheeling.

Think I agree with a poster above. When I was in the USNavy and we were practicing and training for NBC (Nuke/Bio/Chem) warfare, one of the things we were taught, in Nuke at least, was to spend hours if necessary, but to scrub every square cm of body hair, everywhere because fallout would cling to it far better than skin.

I think they were handling anthrax and the shaving was to prevent it from sticking and made it easier to decontaminate.

Godspeed

[Pharmboy]

I had the same thought (not that there's anything wrong with that). ;-)

[FITZ]

There are many levels of torture. Low level torture, meaning no maiming, along with certain drugs will do the trick in my opinion. The subjects in question are not hardened enough to resist it

Yes, that's all I meant. I wouldn't want to resort to their kind of torture like cutting off limbs and gouging eyes, we are a sophisticated country with high technology, I think there are methods which would be very very effective and which would save many lives which would be lost in a prolonged war or failure to find out terrorist plots. Sodium pentathol given to a person with electrodes applied in various places, I'm sure some stimulation to parts of the brain to help memory recall could be useful, but also electrical jolts given to induce some serious pain in other areas.

Also it might not be considered torture but a nice cocaine or heroin addiction might be good for getting some to give up secrets in exchange for their next drug high.

[syriacus]

[Conservative4Life]

maybe they didn't get word that one of the pilots was arrested in Mpls a month prior, he's still in court and aclu is trying to get him freed

[syriacus]

[VOA]

bump