7NEWS Investigates: Ul-Fuqra Militants In Colorado
Tony Kovaleski Report Aired Dec. 10, 2001
Posted: 5:52 p.m. MST December 10, 2001
Updated: 9:29 p.m. MST December 10, 2001
DENVER -- Disturbing similarities are surfacing between the al-Qaida network and a militant Islamic group in Colorado. Tony Kovaleski and 7NEWS Investigates spent several weeks exploring the connection.
Experts describe ul-Fuqra as a violent African-American Muslim group.
Are Militant Islamic Groups Living In Colorado?
In Denver, law enforcement linked ul-Fuqra to a 1984 firebomb at a Hare Krishna temple.
It was an improbable discovery in Colorado Springs that may have ended the group's stay in the state.
"They had fake IDs, fake birth certificates -- this was a well thought-out operation," Ken Lane of the Colorado Attorney General's Office.
That is why investigators are looking closely at the attacks of Sept. 11 and the history of the ul-Fuqra militant Islamic sect.
"There are others -- there are people around the country trying to make that connection (between al-Qaida and ul-Fuqra). We have no idea of knowing if that connection exists or not. Some say there are definite ties," Lane said.
In the early 1990s, police arrested several members of the ul-Fuqra group after a surprising finding in a storage locker in Colorado Springs.
"They uncovered a whole lot more than just ordinary storage stuff," Lane said.
The manager of the storage complex went looking for them after ul-Fuqra members stopped paying the rent. Inside the locker, police found weapons including 30-40 pounds of explosives, three large pipe bombs, 10 handguns, and bomb making instructions.
They also located documentation on guerilla warfare, understanding amateur radios, fair weather flying and blueprint reading.
Lane said that law enforcement was pleased to make the discovery.
"Oh absolutely. I think you are probably right there. If this had gone on any further there, who knows what could have developed," he said.
Law enforcement sources told 7NEWS that they believe the Colorado cell of ul-Fuqra left the state following the arrests and convictions in the early 1990s.
Throughout the country, sources said that there may be as many as 30 active cells of ul-Fuqra.
From the Colorado Attorney General's Office:
INFORMATION REGARDING COLORADO'S INVESTIGATION AND PROSECUTION OF MEMBERS OF JAMAAT UL FUQRA
Beginning in the late 1980s, the Colorado Attorney General's Office successfully prosecuted members of a fundamentalist Sufi-militant Islamic sect known as "JAMAAT UL FUQRA". Five FUQRA members were ultimately prosecuted between 1993 and 1994.
"FUQRA" is an Arabic word, which translates most accurately as "the impoverished". The sect advocates the purification of the Islamic religion by means of force and violence. Sheikh Mubarik Ali Jilani Hasmi, who is known by many other aliases, and who also calls himself the sixth Sultan Ul Faqr, originated this group in Pakistan.
In addition to being suspected of committing numerous acts of domestic terrorism, FUQRA members in the United States have been suspected of committing fraud against various governmental entitlement programs in an effort to financially support their activities.
Colorado's investigation indicated that the United States FUQRA movement was composed of approximately 30 different 'Jamaats' or communities, somewhat mobile in nature. Most of these 'Jamaats' are believed to currently exist today, along with what investigators deemed to be several 'covert paramilitary training compounds' -- one of which had been located in a remote mountainous area near Buena Vista, Colorado prior to Colorado's prosecutions in the mid-1990s. The corresponding FUQRA 'Jamaat' to the Buena Vista compound was located in Colorado Springs, Colorado.
Colorado's investigation of FUQRA was initiated in 1989 when Colorado Springs Police Department detectives, initially investigating a series of burglaries, were contacted by the owner of a storage locker site and were told about a locker of, what appeared to be, abandoned property.
In September 1989, detectives executed a search warrant of the storage locker upon suspicion of illegal explosives. The search of the locker disclosed numerous items believed to belong to the FUQRA sect then residing in that area. Several explosive components-- thirty to forty pounds of explosives, three large pipe bombs, a number of smaller improvised explosive devices, shape charges, ten handguns-- some with obliterated serial numbers-- silencers in various stages of manufacture, military training manuals, reloading equipment, bomb-making instructions, and numerous FUQRA-related publications were located in this storage area. Titles of some of the publications included "Guerilla Warfare", "Counter Guerilla Operations", "Understanding Amateur Radio", and "Fair Weather Flying," and "Basic Blueprint Reading and Sketching." Several silhouettes for firearms target practice were also discovered, including one with the words "FBI Anti-terrorist team" written on the target's torso bullseye.
Of great interest to law enforcement officials were documents concerning potential 'targets' for destruction and murder in the Los Angeles, Tucson, and Denver areas, including surveillance-type photographs, maps with hand-drawn overlays, notes, etc., concerning these targets. In addition, references to Buckley Air National Guard Base, Rocky Mountain Arsenal, the Air Force Academy, and electrical facilities in Colorado, and Warren Air Force Base, and two Wyoming National Guard armories in Wyoming were found. A somewhat detailed description of a firebombing attack on what is believed to have been the Hare Krishna Temple in Denver was also discovered. An attack, as described in these writings, did, in fact, take place in Denver in August 1984, causing an estimated $200,000 in damage. Investigation by Denver authorities at that time revealed that a Hare Krishna Temple in Philadelphia, where FUQRA activity also had been noted, was firebombed in a similar fashion.
Among the many documents found in the Colorado Springs' storage locker were numerous blank birth certificates; blank social security cards; several sets of Colorado drivers' licenses, each containing a picture of the same individual, but each with a different identity; and many underground press publications concerning the assembly of phony identification -- to be reproduced in a manner to "withstand even close government scrutiny". Finally, the search disclosed a number of workers' compensation claims, which ultimately led to a full-scale fraud investigation being conducted by the Colorado Department of Labor and Employment in coordination with the Colorado Attorney General's Office and the Federal Bureau of Investigation Joint Terrorist Task Force.
This investigation revealed that Colorado Springs FUQRA members had defrauded the Colorado Department of Labor and Employment of approximately $350,000 dollars between September 1984 and January 1992. The mobility and multiple addresses and identities of the various FUQRA members posed a significant challenge to early detection and normal prevention of the fraud. As a result of the two-year investigation, five FUQRA members were indicted by the statewide grand jury in September 1992 on racketeering charges involving theft, mail fraud, and forgery. Six months after the indictments, further racketeering charges, including theft of rental property, conspiracy to commit murder and arson (the Denver Hare Krishna Temple), were also filed against the five individuals and a sixth person -- all FUQRA members. Some of the fraudulently obtained workers' compensation funds were traced directly to payments for a parcel of land near Buena Vista used by the group as a residence compound and training site.
One of the FUQRA defendants convicted is James D. Williams. After his conviction in 1993 for conspiracy to commit first degree murder, racketeering, and forgery, Williams fled and remained a fugitive until being apprehended in Virginia in August 2000. He was returned to Colorado and sentenced this past March to 69 years in prison. From at least the middle 1980's through 1990, Williams was a leader of a Colorado FUQRA.
The conviction for conspiracy to commit first degree murder referred to a comprehensive written plan for the murder of a Tucson, Arizona Muslim cleric, Rashad Khalifa. Khalifa was murdered in January 1990 in a manner that was remarkably similar to the written plan.
It is believed the activities of UL FUQRA across the nation continue. Just recently the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco & Firearms (BATF) arrested one of the former Colorado defendants and FUQRA member, Vincente Rafael Pierre, in Virginia on alleged ammunition violations. In California, a FUQRA member was arrested on the suspected murder of a Fresno County Deputy Sheriff this last August. In addition, FUQRA operates something called the Quranic Open University in Los Angeles, which has received over $1.5 million dollars over the course of the last two years in charter school funding. This entity is also located in New York City and Philadelphia. There are believed to be active UL FUQRA training compounds still existing in New York, Michigan, South Carolina, California, and perhaps other states.
FUQRA or its members have been investigated for alleged terrorist acts including murder and arson in New York, Detroit, Philadelphia, Toronto, Denver, Los Angeles and Tucson. UL FUQRA is suspected of more than thirteen firebombings and, at least, as many murders within the United States.