Friday, November 18, 2011

 
Fake terror plots, paid informants: the tactics of FBI 'entrapment' questioned

Critics say bureau is running a sting operation across America, targeting vulnerable people by luring them into fake terror plots

UK Guardian

David Williams did not have an easy life. He moved to Newburgh, a gritty, impoverished town on the banks of the Hudson an hour or so north of New York, at just 10 years old. For a young, black American boy with a father in jail, trouble was everywhere.

Williams also made bad choices. He ended up going to jail for dealing drugs. When he came out in 2007 he tried to go straight, but money was tight and his brother, Lord, needed cash for a liver transplant. Life is hard in Newburgh if you are poor, have a drug rap and need cash quickly.

His aunt, Alicia McWilliams, was honest about the tough streets her nephew was dealing with. "Newburgh is a hard place," she said. So it was perhaps no surprise that in May, 2009, David Williams was arrested again and hit with a 25-year jail sentence. But it was not for drugs offences. Or any other common crime. Instead Williams and three other struggling local men beset by drug, criminal and mental health issues were convicted of an Islamic terrorist plot to blow up Jewish synagogues and shoot down military jets with missiles.

Even more shocking was that the organisation, money, weapons and motivation for this plot did not come from real Islamic terrorists. It came from the FBI, and an informant paid to pose as a terrorist mastermind paying big bucks for help in carrying out an attack. For McWilliams, her own government had actually cajoled and paid her beloved nephew into being a terrorist, created a fake plot and then jailed him for it. "I feel like I am in the Twilight Zone," she told the Guardian...[Full Article]


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Thursday, June 30, 2011

 
FBI Entraps Two More Muslims

Veterans Today

by Stephen Lendman

By now, the familiar storyline sounds more like a film plot than criminal indictment, especially when Muslims are involved, and the most recent case repeats the same scenario used last December.

Then it involved Antonio Martinez, aka Muhammad Hussain, accused of plotting to attack an armed forces recruiting center. An undercover FBI agent lawlessly entrapped him, supplying an inert bomb, then stopping him after he allegedly tried to detonate it by remote control. A previous article discussed him, accessed through the following link:

In fact, like dozens of others, he was maliciously ensnared by an FBI orchestrated sting operation, entrapping him to declare another war on terror victory. Innocence or guilt doesn’t matter, just the illusion that America is now safer when, in fact, each conviction assures greater insecurity, leaving many to wonder who’s next...[Full Article]

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Wednesday, October 20, 2010

 
Accused Backpack Bomber Pleads Not Guilty

FoxNews.com

ctober 20, 2010 - 12:36 PM | by: Ruth Ravve

CHICAGO- A 22 year old who allegedly thought being a terrorist would make him some quick cash, plead "not guilty" today in federal court. Lebanese immigrant Sami Samir Hassoun is charged with attempted use of a weapon of mass destruction.

Police say Hassoun placed a backpack, that he thought was stuffed with explosives, near a busy intersection just outside Chicago's Wrigley Field. Hassoun thought the backpack was lethal because undercover FBI agents told him so, as part of a sting operation.

Hassoun, wearing the standard orange jailhouse jumpsuit, gave a big smile to his family who were sitting in the courtroom. Defense attorney Myron Auerbach, who told the judge he needs more time to go through "more than 100 hours of video surveillance tape" says "my client is not a terrorist...arresting authorities made it clear that he has no terrorist connections". Instead Auerbach characterizes Hassoun as "a troubled young man who got himself into something that took him way beyond where someone else would've gone.....he's a big talker...he just talks too much". While he won't go so far as to use the term "entrapment", Auerbach does blame the FBI for giving Hassoun the (fake) bomb and cash for the deal.

The next status hearing for Hassoun is scheduled for November 3rd, although Auerbach says he will try to postone that date so he will have time to go through all the evidence against his client.

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Tuesday, October 19, 2010

 

FBI Gets Convictions Against Entrapped Dupes Who Planned to Blow Up Synagogues in Bronx

Four men convicted of plot to blow up New York synagogues
Four men face life in prison after being convicted of plotting to blow up synagogues in New York and shoot down military planes.

Four men convicted of plot to blow up New York synagogues
James Cromitie (centre) Photo: AP

The group - James Cromitie, David Williams, Onta Williams and Laguerre Payen - were caught in an FBI sting operation.

Shahed Hussain, an undercover informant, was hired by officers in 2008 to infiltrate a mosque in Newburgh, about an hour north of New York.

A court heard that there he hatched a plan with Cromitie, 44, to blow up synagogues in the Bronx area of New York with remote-controlled bombs.

The other men, aged between 28 and 24, were recruited to the scheme and planned to shoot down cargo planes with heat-seeking missiles.

The men were seen in secretly filmed video footage practising with a missile launcher and praying together in a warehouse in Connecticut two weeks before the planned attack.

They were arrested last year after planting bombs, which they did not know were FBI-supplied fakes, in the Riverdale section of the Bronx...

[Full Article]


Jury convicts four men in New York synagogue bomb plot after 'Big Brother' style surveillance

Four men have today been found guilty of 30 out of 32 counts stemming from the May 2009 plot to bomb two Bronx synagogues and shoot down military aircraft at a National Guard airbase in Newburgh, New York.

James Cromitie had been accused of scheming with a government informant he met at a mosque in Newburgh but the plot was foiled by a perfectly executed FBI sting.

Prosecutors said Cromitie recruited the three co-defendants David Williams, 29, Onta Williams,29, and Laguerre Payen,28, to fire heat-seeking missiles at cargo planes and blow them out of the sky.

In what was was called a terrorism version of Big Brother, the accused architects of the bomb plot were followed and listened to by law enforcement officials at all times.

The Muslim converts were under constant surveillance from early on in their plans until they were busted by cops last year.

The sting apparently never put New Yorkers at risk but the defendants 'thought this was real - real bombs, real missiles - every step of the way', according to Assistant U.S. Attorney David Raskin.

The federal court jury in Manhattan deliberated for eight days before finding the four defendants guilty of charges including conspiracy to use weapons of mass destruction and conspiracy to acquire and use anti-aircraft missiles to kill U.S. officers and employees.

Cromite and David Williams were convicted of all eight counts, while Onta Williams and Laguerre Payen were convicted of seven out of the eight charges.

U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said in a statement that homegrown terrorism was a 'serious threat' and added: 'We are safer today as a result of these convictions.

He said the defendants agreed to plant bombs and use missiles 'they thought were very real weapons of terrorism'.

The trial featured 13 days of testimony by undercover mole, Shahed Hussain who met Cromitie at a mosque north of New York City.

The paid FBI informant helped make hundreds of hours of audio and video tapes between the terrorists which were given to officials and used as evidence.

The defence had argued that the government entrapped their clients but the prosecution were determined to avoid the complication that has derailed previous terror cases and took necessary steps to avoid that.

Authorities had bugged the Newburgh home of apparent ringleader Cromitie, the other three defendants as well as some of their haunts...

[Full Article]


Related Article:

FBI stings for alleged would-be terrorists not unusual

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