Somali refugee who worked as an airport taxicab driver here was secretly plotting with leaders of an insurgent group back home to fund the terrorist organization, according to documents made public during his guilty plea Thursday.
Mohamud Abdi Yusuf, 31, acknowledged through his plea that throughout 2008 and 2009, he raised nearly $6,000 for al-Shabaab, an organization trying to topple the provisional government in war-torn Somalia.
The U.S. government named al-Shabaab a terrorist organization in 2008.
In a public statement, Dennis Baker, special agent in charge of the FBI in St. Louis, underlined the importance of the conviction, saying at least 20 American citizens have traveled to Somalia to join al-Shabaab, which has top leaders affiliated with al-Qaida.
The money at issue went toward a vehicle al-Shabaab used for tactical operations and to hide and deliver weapons, Assistant U.S. Attorney Matthew Drake said in federal court here.
In plotting the money transfers, Yusuf used aliases and held coded conversations with Sheikh Saaid, a mid-level group platoon leader, according to the plea agreement. They used references to al-Shabaab including: "the youth," "the skull-breakers," "the teeth grinders," "the general cause" and "males who wear short pants."
The plea agreement says Yusuf spoke regularly with an unnamed co-conspirator in San Diego who, according to wiretapped conversations, was passing on direct orders from Aden Hashi Ayrow, the principal military leader and commander of al-Shabaab. Ayrow, who declared a "holy war" against Ethiopian and other African Union supporters in Somalia, died in a missile strike in 2008.
The man in San Diego appears to have been the hub for funneling money from the U.S. to the group, according to court documents.
The documents say Yusuf used various aliases and that his link to the group was a man named Duane Mohamed Diriye, whom he met at a Somalian refugee camp before immigrating to the U.S. He told Yusuf the fighters would "jump out of the vehicle, kill their targets, get back in and flee."
The outlined conversations indicate Yusuf had a more prominent role than might otherwise be assumed based on the amount of money transferred.
His is the first post-Sept. 11 international terrorism case to be prosecuted in the court's Eastern District of Missouri.
Yusuf's arrest on Nov. 1 stirred anger in the city's Somali community, and had some accusing authorities of strong-arm tactics. A Post-Dispatch report outlined how that same day FBI agents singled out several dozen Somali cab drivers at Lambert-St. Louis International Airport for questioning, seeking to copy their cell phone memory cards and to examine their personal computers.
U.S. Attorney Richard Callahan declined to comment on the investigative tactics at the time. In what he said was an unrelated move, he appointed an assistant U.S. attorney as an outreach coordinator to the area's growing Islamic community.
Yusuf's defense attorney, Douglas Forsyth, has challenged investigators' use of secret surveillance under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978. His motion to protest it, not uncommon for cases of this type, was rendered moot by Yusuf's guilty plea Thursday. In court, Yusuf spoke only to answer questions from U.S. District Judge Henry Autrey.
When entering his guilty plea for each of four of felony
counts - one for conspiracy, and three for providing material support to a designated terrorist organization - he responded four times, "I did it."
In exchange for his plea, prosecutors dropped charges related to immigration fraud and conspiring on monetary transactions.
Yusuf will face up to 15 years in prison for each count at his sentencing Jan. 31.
Prior to the hearing Yusuf appeared almost relieved, smiling at a group of friends and raising his clasped, chained hands in a greeting.
Forsyth declined comment afterward.
Diriye is believed to be in Kenya. Officials are working to have him extradited to the U.S. Another man, Abdi Mahdi Hussein, a Minneapolis resident and employee of a money-wiring company, also faces charges that he illegally funneled funds.
Source: STLtoday.com
No comments:
Post a Comment