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Padilla indictment avoids high
court showdown
No 'dirty bomb' charges filed against suspect held for three years
NBC News and news services
11/22/05 "NBC"
-- -- WASHINGTON - In a surprise legal development, the Bush
administration announced Tuesday that Jose Padilla, a U.S. citizen
held without charges for more than three years on suspicion of
plotting a “dirty bomb” attack in this country, has instead been
charged with conspiring to “murder, maim and kidnap” people
overseas.
A federal grand jury in Miami added Padilla to a pre-existing
indictment against four others, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales
told reporters.
While the charges allege Padilla was part of a terrorism conspiracy,
they do not include the government’s earlier allegations that he
planned to target the United States by using a radioactive dirty
bomb and blowing up apartment buildings with natural gas.
Gonzales said he expected Padilla to be alongside the other four
when the case goes to trial next September.
“The indictment alleges that Padilla traveled overseas to train as a
terrorist with the intention of fighting a violent jihad,” Gonzales
said.
Saying he could only talk about the specific charges, Gonzales
declined to answer NBC News questions about why none of the
allegations involving attacks in America were included in the
indictment.
Padilla, a Brooklyn-born Muslim convert, had been held as an “enemy
combatant” in Defense Department custody. The Bush administration
had resisted calls to charge and try him in civilian courts.
Charges, names of others
Padilla faces life in prison if convicted on the three charges — one
count each of conspiracy to murder, maim and kidnap people overseas,
providing material support to terrorists and conspiracy.
According to the indictment, Padilla traveled overseas to receive
violent jihad training and to fight violent jihad from October 1993
to November 2001. On July 24, 2000, Padilla allegedly filled out a
“Mujahideen Data Form” in preparation for violent jihad training in
Afghanistan and reportedly was seen in that country in October 2000.
The charges against him and four others allege they were part of a
North American support cell that sent money, assets and recruits
overseas “for the purpose of fighting violent jihad.” The indictment
mentions Afghanistan, Bosnia, Chechnya, Egypt and Bosnia, but makes
no allegations of specific attacks anywhere.
The others indicted are: Adham Amin Hassoun a Lebanese-born
Palestinian who lived in Broward County, Fla.;, Mohammed Hesham
Youssef, an Egyptian who lived in Broward County; Kifah Wael
Jayyousi, a Jordanian national and U.S. citizen who lived in San
Diego; and Kassem Daher, a Lebanese citizen with Canadian residency
status.
Hassoun also was indicted on eight additional charges, including
perjury, obstruction of justice and illegal firearm possession.
Hassoun, a Palestinian computer programmer who moved to Florida in
1989, was arrested in June 2002 for allegedly overstaying his
student visa. Prosecutors previously described him as a former
associate of Padilla.
NBC’s Pete Williams reported that Padilla was being transferred from
Pentagon custody and into the criminal courts system on Tuesday,
ending the long legal battle over whether he should be in military
custody.
The Bush administration had earlier resisted calls to charge and try
Padilla in civilian courts.
No Supreme Court showdown
The indictment avoids a Supreme Court showdown over how long the
government could hold a U.S. citizen without charges. The high court
had been asked to decide when and for how long the government can
jail Americans in military prisons.
“They’re avoiding what the Supreme Court would say about American
citizens (as enemy combatants). That’s an issue the administration
did not want to face,” said Scott Silliman, a Duke University law
professor who specializes in national security. “There’s no way that
the Supreme Court would have ducked this issue.”
Padilla’s lawyers had asked justices to review his case last month,
and the Bush administration was facing a deadline next Monday for
filing its legal arguments.
“The ‘evidence’ the government has offered against Padilla over the
past three years consists of double and triple hearsay from secret
witnesses, along with information allegedly obtained from Padilla
himself during his two years of incommunicado interrogation,” his
lawyers said in their earlier appeal.
Padilla, a former Chicago gang member, was arrested at Chicago’s
O’Hare International Airport in 2002 after returning from Pakistan.
The federal government has said he was trained in weapons and
explosives by members of al-Qaida.
Padilla has been held at a Navy brig in South Carolina. Following
the indictment, which was handed up last Thursday, President Bush
sent a memo to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld ordering Padilla
transferred to the federal detention facility in Miami.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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