Saturday, November 13, 2010
 David Joles, Star Tribune About 80 people, including Somali community leaders and local politicians, met at the Safari Restaurant in Minneapolis to discuss recent allegations of gang activity and sex trafficking in the community. “This is not who we are. We are decent people,’’ said Abdil Ahmed, co-owner of the restaurant. |
The need for unity in the Somali community was a key message of speakers at a meeting Friday night that drew more than 80 people to a midtown Minneapolis restaurant. Even so, disagreement was evident about the nature and extent of Somali gang activity.
"We are standing together and want our kids to get a fair trial," said Hodan Hassan, a meeting organizer who said she was not related to any of the accused or the alleged victims.
Several speakers urged the public to withhold judgment of the accused while the legal process unfolds. The defendants may not be guilty, and the media have wrongly portrayed them as representatives of the whole Somali community, some argued.
Friday's meeting came four days after federal agents and local police rounded up more than a dozen suspects in the alleged ring.
In an indictment made public Monday, the government alleges that members of three local Somali gangs -- the Somali Outlaws, the Somali Mafia and the Lady Outlaws -- carried out a 10-year conspiracy that includes the sex trafficking of minors, burglary, credit card fraud, intimidation and perjury.
Twenty-nine people have been indicted by a federal grand jury, most of them accused of selling four underage girls -- one as young as 12 -- as prostitutes.
Some at Friday's meeting, including Hassan, said they don't believe the accused are gang members. Asked whether she believes Somali gangs are active in Minneapolis, she said, "I have never seen any at all."
Source: Star Tribune