 |
| Terrorism suspect Nuradin Abdi's trial is scheduled for Aug. 7 (AP Photo/U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement) |
But in papers filed for Abdi's upcoming terrorism trial, Abdi paints Paul, a Worth-
ington graduate, and Columbus truck driver Iyman Faris, who is serving a 20-year prison term for scouting the Brooklyn Bridge for al-Qaida, as active terrorism supporters.
Abdi paints himself as a fundamentalist who simply rubbed elbows with them.
Abdi said that in summer 2001, Paul asked him to provide stolen credit-card numbers from his cell-phone business, according to a government document.
Abdi told the FBI he believed Paul intended to use the credit-card numbers to buy laptop computers, that would be shipped to al-Qaida training camps. It was similar to other computer equipment Paul had sent.
Abdi's attorney, Mahir Sherif, counters that Abdi can provide witnesses and records showing the credit-card numbers were never used.
The FBI began investigating Abdi, a Somali immigrant, and Paul, who grew up in Worthington as Paul Kenyatta Laws, in 2003.
Faris told agents about a conversation that the three had at the Caribou Coffee on Lane Avenue in Upper Arlington the year before. Faris said Abdi was upset about the U.S. invasion in Afghanistan and suggested shooting up a shopping mall.
Abdi told a different version, according to an FBI report submitted in his case: He said Faris was upset and suggested they destroy the Hoover Dam. Abdi then suggested they blow up a shopping mall.
He told the FBI that Faris and Paul responded that his plan was poor, "in that they were trying to accomplish something bigger than an explosion in a mall, which would not kill enough people."
Faris asked if he knew how to make explosives, and Abdi said he didn't. Days later, Paul gave Abdi 10 CDs that he said would teach Abdi to make explosives -- instructions, Abdi says in another document, that he threw away.
The FBI report also says Abdi told agents that in the winter of 2002-03, Faris told him and Paul that he'd met Osama bin Laden, and that Faris was looking into a plan to fire missiles at targets in Washington, D.C. Faris later said the plan was canceled because the "guys in Virginia" said it couldn't be done.
The new information is in papers that Abdi's attorney and the government are filing as they argue over whether the statements and other evidence can be used at Abdi's Aug. 7 trial.
Abdi and Paul are charged with conspiring to support terrorism. Abdi, who was indicted in 2004, is accused of lying to obtain travel documents and attempting to attend a terrorist training camp in Africa. Paul, indicted in April, is accused of helping train terrorists for attacks on Americans abroad. His trial is scheduled for Jan. 5, 2009.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Dana Peters declined to talk about the case, but a document revealed statements that Abdi supposedly made in a closed Immigration Court hearing in Detroit on March 9, 2004:
Abdi told Immigration Judge Elizabeth A. Hacker that he had identified al-Qaida operatives to the FBI and told the agents where al-Qaida operatives were training so they could target the camps.
He argued against being deported to Somalia, saying his cooperation with the government here would put him at risk of being killed.
Hacker said that by his own admissions, Abdi lied on asylum papers to get into the country and that he was a danger to the United States. She ordered him deported in 2004, but Abdi has been held pending the criminal charges.
Source: Columbus Dispatch, June 15, 2007