Posted on 02/13/2002 2:42:31 PM PST by Shermy
By Bill Dries, dries@gomemphis.com
A Memphis woman allegedly at the center of a scheme to sell fraudulent Tennessee driver's licenses was identified Tuesday as the person whose burned body was found early Sunday in the wreckage of a car in Fayette County. L icense examiner Katherine Smith was probably alive when her car hit a utility pole on U.S. 72 near the Mississippi state line, said Tennessee Highway Patrol Lt. Col. Mark Fagan.
Smith, 49, died the day before she was due to appear before a federal magistrate judge for a detention hearing on a charge of conspiracy to obtain fraudulent identification documents.
The Highway Patrol and the FBI were continuing a joint investigation Tuesday into the one-car crash. The agencies are also working together in the ongoing criminal investigation into the fraud charge. Fagan said investigators want to know if the fatal car wreck and the driver's license scheme "intertwine criminally," or if Smith's death was a coincidence.
"We're not ruling out anything. We're looking at all aspects of that investigation," he said by phone from Nashville.
"We have a crash. We have a car that's hit a pole and we know it burned. Now, what sequence - that's part of the investigation."
Smith and five co-defendants were arrested Feb. 5 after they left the state driver testing station on Summer Avenue. Prosecutors said Smith had processed four driver's license applications that morning based on false information provided by co-defendant Khaled Odtllah, 31, of Shelby County.
Smith, describing Odtllah as a friend, told authorities that he had asked her to help him obtain driver's licenses six or seven times before.
Codefendants Mohammed Fares, Mostafa Said Abou-Shahin and Abdelmuhsen Mahmid Hammad are scheduled to appear before a federal magistrate judge today. The FBI said the men drove to Memphis from New York last week to get Tennessee driver's licenses. Their ages and addresses were unavailable.
Odtllah and Sakhera Hammad, 24, of New York City, the other alleged middleman, made their appearance on Monday, when they were ordered held without bond until trial.
The FBI has custody of Smith's charred Acura, which she bought from Odtllah, at an undisclosed location in Memphis, said Memphis FBI spokesman George Bolds.
"(Smith) was the subject of a pending FBI investigation. Her death coming at the time it did is very coincidental. We're looking at that," Bolds said. "As best we can, we'd like to recreate what happened and try to determine whether or not there was any sort of foul play in connection with her death or whether it was an auto accident."
At Monday's hearing, federal prosecutor Tim DiScenza described Smith's death as "most unusual and suspicious." He also said two of her co-defendants had "connections" to the World Trade Center, which was destroyed in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
Attorney Anthony Helm, representing Odtllah, accused DiScenza of raising the terrorism issue based solely on the Middle East origins of Smith's co-defendants. While Smith was released on her own recognizance pending Monday's hearing, her co-defendants have remained in federal custody since their arrest.
Smith's burned body was found in the 1992 Acura Sunday morning shortly after midnight. She was traveling westbound on U.S. 72 near the intersection with county route 196, Fagan said. At that point, the car veered off the road, went through a ditch and hit a utility pole.
The car caught fire, but the gas tank did not explode, FBI agent J. Suzanne Nash testified Monday.
Citing a report from the Shelby County Medical Examiner's Office, Fagan said Smith was identified through dental records and that there was evidence she had inhaled smoke. To a layman, Fagan said, the evidence suggests Smith was alive when the car caught fire.
"You obviously would have to be breathing to inhale smoke, which would tell you that she was not deceased prior to impact."
The Shelby County Medical Examiner's Office referred all questions to Dr. Frank S. McKnight, the Fayette County medical examiner. McKnight's office referred all questions to the Highway Patrol.
The Highway Patrol has assigned a "critical incident response team" to the case. Fagan described the team as a "highly specialized unit of troopers'' trained in all aspects of crash investigation.
Gene Marquez, resident agent in charge of the Memphis office of the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, said the ATF is contributing an ATF-certified fire investigator cross- trained as an explosives expert.
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Related Commerical Appeal story [Feb 13]: Stricter rules for aliens may rise from wreck
WMC-TV 5 Check out stories and video links.
Earlier FR thread: Feds fear license examiner is dead - Memphis Woman's co-defendants tied to 9/11, judge told
A link to the Washington D.C. tow truck bust:
Two Middle East men arrested outside Pentagon - Fake drivers licenses spur troopers to call in FBI
And a link to the North Carolina attempted fuel truck hijacking:
Fuel Truck Highjack Stopped in North Carolina [Feb. 13]
Was Ms Smith a Muslim????? Seems to me that would be one of the FIRST things any competent investigator would want to know in this case.
This is going to create a huge push for a national ID card, with all that entails. Just watch.
IMO she was killed to prevent her from giving out any of these names.
It is entirely possible that she was simply silenced by others involved in selling licenses. It could be a big operation and part of gang or orgainized crime. She looked to be just one small fish in a deep and smelly pond. This could have been going on for years.
Richard W.
One of the arrested men was a "Jerusalem-born Palestinian" according the press. Don't look for a clear answer in print.
on a recent trip to tunica, I noticed the big service station around casino row & old 61 was shut down.
this was the station that had the Krystal Burger restaurant (for those who could only afford a 12 pack of Krystals to gettum back home?)
at the risk of being "PinC", the convenience store was run by a couple of ME, and I've notice they have been totally shut down since the license examiner's murder. (which was also about the time of the announced round up of the 4,000 or so ME illegals)
anybody in the mid south know what's going on?
Belly Bombed all of their Customers? Sounds like a Radical Islamic trick to me!
Us Gormets only frequent White Castle Emporiums. Goes well with a nice Chardonney, Vintage of January.
Just axe Mancini.
I heard that location was gonna be a new Mancini's Toasted Ravioli joint. Much Classier. Their vino is Vintage of August. Somethin' ----"Red".
Mancini, Thinden is a Goombah. I heard poohbah or sinkspur say so.
Poohpooh or stinksupdajoint? They don't know from nuttin'. If thinden is really a goombah,
you will have to post a picture. I will be able to tell by the nose (his, not mine).
MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) - Five Middle Eastern men pleaded innocent Wednesday to federal charges that they tried to illegally get Tennessee driver's licenses.
The defendants were arrested Feb. 5 along with Katherine Smith, 49, a Tennessee driver's license examiner who died five days later in a car fire authorities say was intentionally set.
A medical examiner's report on the cause of her death is pending, and authorities are still investigating.
Kahled Odtllah, 31, Sakher Hammad, 24, Mostafa Said Abou-Shahin, 25, Abdelmuhsen Mahmid Hammad, 31, and Mohammed Fares, 19, are charged with conspiring to illegally produce identification documents. They face up to five years in prison.
Defense lawyers have said the men traveled to Memphis from New York because they heard it was easy to get driver's licenses in Tennessee, where Social Security numbers are not required.
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