Lawyers ask court to throw out case against Al Qaeda suspects
By Anwar Iqbal
BUFFALO, NY, Sept 20: Defence lawyers for the six men accused of being members of an Al Qaeda-trained sleeper cell in upstate New York have asked that the case against their clients be thrown out because the government has no evidence to prove the suspects were involved in terrorist activities.
And law experts said on Friday the prosecution may find it difficult to prove the charges against the suspects.
They said the Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 — made after the 1995 bombing of the Oklahoma City federal building — does not apply to these suspects.
According to them, the law is meant to deal with those accused of “providing, attempting to provide and conspiring to provide material support and resources to designated terrorist organizations.”
There’s nothing in this law that specifically bars anyone from attending a terrorist training camp — or from supporting Al Qaeda.
“The law does not prohibit being a member of one of the designated terrorist groups or vigorously promoting or supporting the political goals of the group,” Judge Alex Kozinsky of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in California wrote in a 200 decision.
“Plaintiffs are even free to praise the groups for using terrorism as a means to achieving their ends. What the law prohibits is the act of giving material support,” he wrote.
Based on what’s known about the Sleepers Cell case, legal experts presume “material support” to be the men themselves. But to use their association with Al Qaeda as providing “material support” to the group, the prosecution will have to prove that they participated in terrorist activities or were planning to participate in such activities. So far the prosecution has revealed no evidence to prove this point.
Law experts say that to convict the suspects, the prosecutors may need harder evidence than they’ve revealed. “What counts is real proof,” says Lee Albert, a law professor at the University at Buffalo. “And this is not an easy charge to prove.”
Meanwhile, the defence lawyers are working on two separate legal fronts to get their clients out of the prison. Their immediate concern, they say, is to get the suspects out on bail. They have already asked the court to release their clients on bail because they said the suspects posed no threat to the community.
In a separate filing, lawyers for all six asked that the case be thrown out.
They argued that not only the suspects posed no threat, but if freed, they will return to the court whenever ordered and accept any condition the court places on them.
The attorneys said hundreds of thousands of dollars in real estate and other assets had been collected for whatever bond the court set, indicating the community’s trust in these youngmen.
James P. Harrington, Alwan’s lawyer, and William Clauss, Goba’s attorney, said the prosecution had failed to prove their clients had been involved in a violent crime or were a threat to the community.
But Harrington said on Thursday the prosecution had failed to mention that his client, Alwan, had cooperated with the US authorities and that he had made two attempts to leave the Al Qaeda camp before faking injuries and returning. Harrington said Alwan was afraid of the anti-US rhetoric being used in the camp.
Lawyers representing the six men also have made a separate motion to dismiss the case against their client for lack of probable cause.
Through a notice, made available to the press on Thursday, the lawyers argue that a warrant for the arrest of a defendant may not issue “unless it appears from the complaint or from an affidavit ... that there is probable cause to believe that an offence has been committed and that the defendant has committed it.”
