Trial opens in case of another Uzbek refugee
charged with plotting terror in his home country, by
Ann Corcoran 5/25/18
Trial underway for refugee who challenged NSA surveillance
Trial underway for refugee who challenged NSA surveillance
We
remember when Jamshid Muhtorov was arrested attempting
to leave the country in 2012 and I have wondered what the heck was going on
that his case was not going to trial. Why didn’t we just let him leave? Why was
protecting the Uzbek government our problem? Indeed, why was he here in
the first place?
Before
reading on, you might want to revisit another notorious case of an Uzbek
refugee sentenced to prison in Idaho who subsequently tried to kill the prison
warden where he had been incarcerated, see here.
Now
to the story from Denver about Jamshid Muhtorov where we learn the
trial delay was due to his lawyer’s efforts to challenge the use of information
from NSA surveillance:
DENVER – A refugee from Uzbekistan conspired to support a terrorist
group financially and planned to travel overseas to join them, U.S. prosecutors
said Thursday, walking jurors through a trove of phone calls, emails and other
online activity they said proves the man’s desire to help the group.
The
start of Jamshid Muhtorov’s trial comes more than six years after his arrest at
a Chicago airport. The case led to the U.S. Justice Department’s first
disclosure that it intended to use information obtained through one of the
National Security Agency’s warrantless surveillance programs.
Muhtorov
challenged the constitutionality of the warrantless surveillance program but
Judge John Kane ruled in 2015 that the program may have potential for abuse but
did not violate his rights.
Muhtorov’s
attorney said during opening statements that the former human rights worker did
email with people who claimed to belong to the Islamic Jihad Union, but said he
was play-acting as a distraction from a sometimes difficult transition to
America and never sent the organization money or intended to join them.
Prosecutor
Greg Holloway peppered his opening statement with references to recordings of
Muhtorov’s phone calls and emails, telling jurors that they would hear of
Muhtorov’s desire to help the terror group and become a martyr in “the
defendant’s own words.” One of MANY unhappy refugees in America!
After coming to the Denver area in 2007 through a refugee resettlement
program, prosecutors said he became “frustrated with life” and began emailing with the terror
group through its website. By 2012, he told an FBI informant of plans to join
the group and become a fighter, Holloway said.
Muhtorov
was arrested while waiting to board a flight to Istanbul, and Holloway said
agents found $2,800 in cash, two new iPhones and a new iPad in his luggage. In
a recorded phone call days before the flight, Holloway said Muhtorov asked his
daughter to “pray for your daddy to become a martyr.”
Muhtorov did feel discouraged at times by life in the U.S., said his attorney, Kathryn Stimson. He
worked at a processing plant [meatpacking
we presume!—ed], a casino and then as a truck driver after being a human
rights worker in Uzbekistan.
He also believed that the Islamic Jihad Union’s priority was deposing
the dictator leading Uzbekistan, she
said. Conversations about joining or somehow helping the group were a fantasy,
a way to feel like the respected human rights workers he once was, she said. Using refugee resettlement for unrelated
foreign policy objectives is wrong!
There
was always something very fishy about the Uzbek stream of refugees coming to
the US—-could our State
Department and CIA be helping the ruling ‘moderate’ Muslim Uzbek government by
removing their troublemakers to America and placing them in your unsuspecting
neighborhoods?
Many
of these Uzbeks, like Muhtorov, didn’t
seem to want to be here! So, again, why were they brought here??? And, what did
we get out of the deal for our trouble?
I
discussed the issue of using refugees as pawns for other foreign policy objectives here earlier this month. Fox News continues…..So
other refugees from Uzbekistan were committing crimes? But, this one gets off
free?
They
then turned to another man from Uzbekistan, who she said became an informant to
avoid charges of tax fraud, marriage fraud and immigration fraud. The unnamed
informant developed a relationship with Muhtorov, passing information to
federal authorities about Muhotorov’s claims that he was taking on a role in
the terror group.
Much more here. See my Uzbek archive here.
Norb Leahy, Dunwoody
GA Tea Party Leader
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