Posted on 10/11/2002 6:19:48 PM PDT by Glutton
PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) - One of six people indicted on terrorism charges considered attacking synagogues or Jewish schools on American soil, but then reconsidered, federal prosecutors said.
Assistant U.S. Attorney David Atkinson said Friday that Jeffrey Leon Battle told an FBI informant he wanted to avenge Muslims killed overseas by shooting Jews in America.
``Mr. Battle indicates that he considered engaging in some kind of violent episode - perhaps against a synagogue or a school - in which he contemplates injuring numerous people,'' Atkinson said.
In a conversation with the unnamed informant last spring, Battle said that after the Sept. 11 attacks, he had considered entering a synagogue and shooting people he found there with two Kalashnikov assault rifles, Atkinson said.
Atkinson made the comments during a detention hearing for Battle's ex-wife October Lewis, another of the suspects charged with conspiring to levy war against the United States.
Lewis was ordered released from jail pending trial at a hearing Thursday. U.S. Magistrate Janice Stewart said she saw no evidence Lewis posed a threat to the community or was a flight risk.
But Judge Ancer Haggerty on Friday reversed the earlier decision after hearing a detailed description of Battle's comments. He did not immediately specify why he reversed Thursday's ruling.
Prosecutors say Lewis allegedly wired money to her husband and four other men while they were trying to enter Afghanistan through China. She wired a little more than $2,000 to Battle, and was aware that he would use the money to join the fight against America, prosecutors said.
Charles Gorder, the assistant U.S. attorney prosecuting the case, said Thursday the FBI informant wore a body wire during the conversations with Battle last spring and recorded the menacing comments.
He suggested that evidence would come out at Battle's pretrial hearing, scheduled for Tuesday.
In the conversations, Battle said he wasn't interested in a suicide attack because he wanted to be around to see the damage he caused his victims, prosecutors said.
Besides Battle and Lewis, also charged with conspiracy to levy war were Habis Abdulla al Saoub, 36, who is at-large; Patrice Lumumba Ford, 31, who was arrested last week in Portland and has pleaded innocent; Ahmed Ibrahim Bilal, 24, who turned himself in Sunday in Malaysia; and Bilal's brother, Muhammad Bilal, 22, who was arrested last week in Dearborn, Mich., and pleaded innocent Thursday in Portland.
The group apparently never made it to Afghanistan.
Prosecutors also alleged that Battle contacted an Islamic group in Bangladesh that is said to be a screening agency for al-Qaida. Gorder said John Walker Lindh, the American Taliban, had also contacted the group, which is called Tablighi Jamaat.
Duh? Maybe because the first judge is an idiot.
In the conversations, Battle said he wasn't interested in a suicide attack because he wanted to be around to see the damage he caused his victims, prosecutors said.
Us black folks aren't into suicide missions. We want the other fellow to die. So say this for Battle; he may be a hateful, brutal, ignorant thug, but at least he's sane...
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