Airport worker from Yemen is denied bond

Airport worker from Yemen is denied bond
By MATTHEW ROY, The Virginian-Pilot
© June 22, 2002

A Norfolk International Airport worker detained by immigration officials in a recent security sweep was denied bond Friday after a judge was informed that federal agents want to interview him about the bombing of the Norfolk-based destroyer Cole.

Jamil Ali Jaghman, 26, has said he knew nothing about the Cole and would be willing to speak with agents. His lawyers said the government wants to interview him only because he is from Yemen, the Middle Eastern country where the ship was attacked.

``INS is painting with a very broad brush here,'' said Jim Tom Haynes, the attorney who represented Jaghman at Friday's hearing in Arlington. ``It's in the nature of a general roundup, I'd say.''

Jaghman's attorney, Radlyn C. Mendoza, said her client ``is being held without bond because he is a young man from the Middle East.''

He had been in the Portsmouth City Jail since June 6 and has not yet been interviewed regarding the Oct. 12, 2000, attack on the Cole.

``He was in New York; I was six months pregnant,'' said his wife, Jennifer Noonan Jaghman, a U.S. citizen who met Jaghman in New York. ``The only reason they're holding him is he's Arabic and he's from Yemen. . . . This is pure racial profiling.''

Jaghman was one of 30 current and former airport workers sought in the airport security sweep dubbed Operation Plane View. He and two others faced immigration violations. Others were charged on outstanding arrest warrants or with a federal offense of lying on applications for airport security badges.

To date, 10 of the cases have been dropped. Jaghman is the only person held on an Immigration and Naturalization Service detainer.

Jaghman, a Hertz rental agent, did not appear in court physically but by a video link from Piedmont Regional Jail in Farmville. He entered the United States in 1996. The INS says his application for a green card was denied. Jaghman says he was never informed of that and believed he was in the country legally.

Further, he says the INS continued to issue him work authorization and also allowed him to visit Yemen and then to re-enter the United States in 2001.

The INS said in a court document that Jaghman was ``paroled'' into the United States for one year, until April 23, 2002. That was apparently upon his return from Yemen.

Jaghman and Noonan Jaghman, the mother of his 17-month-old son, were married Wednesday in the Portsmouth City Jail.

Further, he says the INS continued to issue him work authorization and also allowed him to visit Yemen and then to re-enter the United States in 2001.

The INS said in a court document that Jaghman was ``paroled'' into the United States for one year, until April 23, 2002. That was apparently upon his return from Yemen.

Jaghman and Noonan Jaghman, the mother of his 17-month-old son, were married Wednesday in the Portsmouth City Jail.

I guess a slow roundup is better than no roundup.

Something stinks about this guy. He's the only one they're still holding from the Airport roundup and the local TV News has made a real martyr out of him and his poor little wife, but it hasn't helped him a bit. I get the feeling he's in for the long haul, and at the end he'll hget a one way ticket back to Yemen.

Did anyone notice that he attended his hearing via a video conference from the Piedmont Regional Jail in Farmville? I wonder when and why they moved him to Farmville, he was in Portsmouth as late as Wwednesday.

Wonder if Jaghman knows this guy:

Abu Hamza : worked in London with Semi Osman to set up a web site for a British company, Sakina Security Services, that courted clients for what it called the Ultimate Jihad Challenge. That company has been charged by the British government with seeking to "assist or prepare for" terrorism, and its trial is under way in London. U.S. investigators are probing for links between Sakina and the aborted plan for a jihad camp in Bly Oregon. Abu Hamza, who lost both hands and one eye in Afghanistan, has been under investigation for his connections to Islamic terrorism. He has praised the Sept. 11 attacks, saying recently that Muslims who did not support them "are hypocrites on the Muslim nation."

Last year, the U.S. Treasury Department designated Abu Hamza a global terrorist and froze his assets. The department alleges that Abu Hamza was an officer in the Islamic Army of Aden, the terrorist organization that claimed responsibility for the bombing of the USS Cole in Yemen in 2000, which killed 17 American sailors.

Yemen accuses Abu Hamza of sending 10 men from Britain, including his son and a stepson, to attack British and American targets in Aden. The group kidnapped 16 Western tourists, including two Americans, in December 1998. Four of the hostages died during a rescue.

Abu Hamza has been charged in Yemen for that crime, but Britain does not have an extradition agreement with the Middle Eastern nation.

The cleric has long been suspected of recruiting for al-Qaida. He denies that but openly supports bin Laden and publishes incendiary speeches on the Web site set up by Ujaama.

In an interview with Canadian television, he said, "Everybody was happy when the planes hit the World Trade Center. Anybody who tells you that they are not happy, they are hypocrites on the Muslim nation, I am telling you, everybody."

Abu Hamza was arrested in Britain more than two years ago, but no charges were filed. U.S. authorities are frustrated that he hasn't been charged there.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.