According to the following AP wire, the FBI has released noting "noted "recent suspicious activity" by foreigners who either drive school buses or are licensed to drive them". The wire is included below.
Please also note the posting sent out to this group on January 28, 2007 about this same issue, as well as earlier articles I've posted. I'm including a copy of the January 28 posting at the bottom of this email.
Laura
WASHINGTON -- Members of extremist groups have signed up as school bus drivers in the United States, counterterror officials said Friday, in a cautionary bulletin to police. An FBI spokesman said "parents and children have nothing to fear."
Asked about the alert notice, the FBI's Rich Kolko said "there are no threats, no plots and no history leading us to believe there is any reason for concern," although law enforcement agencies around the country were asked to watch out for kids' safety.
The bulletin, parts of which were read to The Associated Press, did not say how often foreign extremists have sought to acquire licenses to drive school buses, or where. It was sent Friday as part of what officials said was a routine FBI and Homeland Security Department advisory to local law enforcement.
It noted "recent suspicious activity" by foreigners who either drive school buses or are licensed to drive them, according to a counterterror official who read parts of the document to The Associated Press.
Foreigners under recent investigation include "some with ties to extremist groups" who have been able to "purchase buses and acquire licenses," the bulletin says.
But Homeland Security and the FBI "have no information indicating these individuals are involved in a terrorist plot against the homeland," it says. The memo also notes: "Most attempts by foreign nationals in the United States to acquire school bus licenses to drive them are legitimate."
Kolko said the bulletin was sent merely as an educational tool to help local police identify and respond to any suspicious activity.
It was not immediately clear whether the extremists intended to do with the school buses. One counterterror official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue, said it was likely that the foreigners investigated were merely employed as bus drivers, and did not intend to use them as part of any terror plot.
Not again: FirstStudent fails to submit Columbus OH school bus drivers for background checks since 2004; same company that employed man indicted in terror charges as school bus driver
by Laura Mansfield
Reports emerged this week that 56,000 Columbus OH school students had their classes canceled because First Student, the contractor responsible for their school buses, had failed to submit their drivers for background checks since 2004.
According to an Associated Press article released on Friday:
Columbus schools canceled classes for their 56,000 students Thursday after a contractor responsible for some school bus routes discovered it had not done complete criminal background checks on drivers.
First Student Inc. had not submitted any of its bus drivers' information to the state for checks since August 2004, said Jennifer Brindisi, spokeswoman for Attorney General Marc Dann.
This is especially concerning considering that this is not the first time that First Student has had problems with its background checks. In fact, one of First Student's bus drivers has been indicted on terrorism-related charges, and was a roommate of a man convicted of luxury hotel bombing and a suspect in the USS Cole attack.
This steller First Student driver was Mohamed Kamal Elzahabi. In 2004, First Student driver Mohamed Kamal Elzahabi was indicted in Minneapolis. The charges: two counts of lying to agents with the FBI's Joint Terrorism Task Force in connection with an international terrorism investigation.
According to a criminal complaint filed in the case, al Zahabi allegedly attended a jihad military training camp and fought in Afghanistan in 1988 and 1989. Later, the indictment alleges he acted as a sniper in combat and also served as an instructor in small arms and sniper skills for other jihadists attending the Khalden training camp in Afghanistan.
Records show he passed the school bus driver portion of his CDL on Oct. 17, 2001, a date Pearson said was around the time First Student hired him and he began driving routes.
On September 11, 2001, Elzahabi applied with First Student of Minneapolis, to become a school bus driver. Elzahabi spent four months as a First Student school bus driver in late 2001, transporting students for the Minneapolis Public Schools. The company fired him in January of 2002 after he failed to report to work, said Jeff Pearson, region vice president with First Student, Inc. First Student is based in Cincinnati, OH, and employs 19,000 drivers on 15,000 school buses nationwide.
Elzahabi also held Commercial Driver's Licenses in Massachusetts, Colorado, and Minnesota, and also had a HAZMAT certification.
While in Massachusetts, Elzahabi's roommate in Everett was none other than Raid Hijazi, who has been convicted of blowing up a luxury hotel in Jordan. Hijazi is also a suspect in the bombing of the USS Cole.
According to an article in School Bus Transportation News at http://www.stnonline.com/stn/security/stn_articles/alqaeda1.htm:
After fighting in Chechnya from late 1999 through 2000, the FBI said, Elzahabi re-entered the United Stats and settled in the Minneapolis area. Pearson said Elzahabi applied with First Student on Sept. 11, 2001, the same day terrorists flew airplanes into the WorldTradeCenter and the Pentagon. At the time, Elzahabi held a valid Massachusetts driver's license and school bus CDL, including hazmat clearance.
It is unclear at this point as to whether or not Elzahabi ever used his school bus CDL in Massachusetts or not.
In that same article, School Bus Transportation News reported on comments about Elzahabi from Jeff Pearson, region vice president with First Student, Inc. said:
First Student, a Cincinnati-based company, employs 19,000 drivers on 15,000 school buses nationwide. The fact that at least one of those drivers may have had connections to Al Qaeda is disturbing to Pearson, but also a sign of how over-stretched background investigators are when attempting to verify a prospective employee's identity and past.
"I don't think we can ever be satisfied with the way background checks are done," Pearson said. "It seems almost impossible to get all the information you need on individuals, especially if they are trying to hide something.
One thing is certain. If you don't do the background check, you get even less information, and it becomes even easier for people to hide information.
I wish I could convince others to get their kids out of public schools for the poor academics ... NOW maybe jihad bus drivers might do it.
Private school is worth its weight in gold.
Minneapolistan. Again. What the hell is going on in that town?!