Friday, October 07, 2011
"Who has the priority? Let the civilians die. Sister, let the civilians die," the Rochester, Minn., woman allegedly told her friend and co-defendant, Hawo Mohamed Hassan, in an October 2008 phone call.
"When a fatwa is issued with regard to this question, which one gets the priority: the poor civilian man, who is dying of natural causes, or the man who stands up for Islam?" she asked.
A tape of the conversation - recorded and translated by the FBI - was among several calls played in federal court in Minneapolis on Thursday in the trial of the two women, who are accused of conspiracy to provide material support to al-Shabaab.
The organization controls much of southern Somalia. Prosecutors claim the women were active fundraisers for al-Shabaab, seeking donations by going door to door and by teleconference and the Internet.
In addition to conspiracy, Ali, 35, faces 12 counts of providing material support for allegedly sending $8,608 to members of al-Shabaab between September 2008 and July 2009. In February 2008, the State Department designated the group as a foreign terrorist organization, making it illegal to provide aid.
Hassan, 64, is also accused of three counts of lying to FBI agents when they questioned her about the alleged scheme.
The women maintain they weren't knowingly funding terrorism. They have said the donations they sought - which included money and clothes - were intended for humanitarian purposes. The government has acknowledged that money that donors specified should go to orphans wound up going to that purpose. (Islam considers taking the property of orphans a major sin.)
After providing a day and a half of background on the tumultuous recent history of Somalia that gave rise to al-Shabaab, Assistant U.S. Attorney Jeffrey Paulsen began introducing some of the 150-plus recordings of phone calls the government has identified as potential trial exhibits.
The calls were culled from almost 30,000 phone conversations recorded by the FBI over a 10-month period from court-sanctioned wiretaps on Ali's home phone and cellphone. A team of five FBI linguists spent several months translating them.
FBI Special Agent Michael Wilson of Rochester told the 12 women and three men who make up the jury and three alternates that the investigation began in the summer of 2008 after someone at FBI headquarters came across information that Ali was allegedly in contact with members of al-Shabaab.
It was at about the same time the FBI in Minneapolis was beginning to investigate the exodus of about 20 young Somali men with Twin Cities ties back to their homeland. Officials feared the men had been recruited to fight for al-Shabaab; between February 2009 and June of this year, 18 people aside from Ali and Hassan have been charged in connection with the exodus.
At least two of those charged are believed to have died as fugitives, fighting in Somalia.
Ali and Hassan, both naturalized U.S. citizens, are the only ones charged with fundraising for al-Shabaab, a group the government claims is linked to al-Qaida.
Hassan was a teacher in her homeland. In court, she listens to the interpreted proceedings through headphones and smiles easily. The younger Ali, who works at home caring for her invalid mother, is more taciturn and, judging from the English-language translations of the calls, appears an ardent supporter of the forces fighting against Somalia's U.N.-backed transitional government.
Ali created a stir early in the trial when she refused to stand when court was called into session and recessed. She cited religious reasons, but Chief U.S. District Judge Michael Davis found her in contempt and ordered her jailed.
On Wednesday morning, she had a change of heart and began to stand.
The government says Ali is the one who had contacts among al-Shabaab's leadership in Somalia, and several of the phone conversations introduced as evidence are between her and Hassan Afgoye, identified as an al-Shabaab regional governor.
Paulsen also began introducing evidence of some of the 12 money transfers that Ali supposedly made to al-Shabaab members in Somalia. The transfers, between Sept. 17, 2008, and July 5, 2009, varied in amount; the largest was $1,195, the smallest $250.
In some calls, Ali talked about sending money and Afgoye talked about skirmishes or suicide bombings al-Shabaab had been involved in.
The trial is attracting an eclectic group of spectators. The most numerous have been supporters of the defendants; at times, 20 women or more, their heads covered with hijabs and wearing colorful direhs (the billowing traditional Somali dresses) have filled several rows of spectator seating.
Omar Jamal, a former Minneapolis resident and current first secretary of Somalia's mission to the U.N., has also sat in on the proceedings. On Thursday, he spent time chatting with former Ramsey County Sheriff Bob Fletcher, now an employee of the St. Paul Police Department who has founded a group called the Center for Somalia History Studies.
David Hanners can be reached at 612-338-6516.