DETROIT , Aug. 15, 2006
Is Owning 1,000 Cell Phones Terrorism?
Serious Questions Arise About Arrest Of 3 Palestinian-Americans
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Play CBS Video Video Trio Held On Terror Charges Three men were arrested in Caro, Mich., after they purchased 80 prepaid mobile phones from a Wal-Mart store. Dave Browde reports.
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From left to right; Adham Abdelhamid Othman, Maruan Awad Muhareb, and Louai Abdelhamied Othman (AP Photo/The Saginaw News)
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The Coast Guard has increased patrols near the Mackinac Bridge connecting Michigan's upper and lower peninsulas. (www.mackinacbridge.org)
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Cell phones are shown in a box Friday, Aug. 11, 2006, in Caro, Mich., after three men of Middle Eastern descent were arrested Friday and were being held on terrorism charges after they purchased 80 prepaid cell phones from a Wal-Mart store, police said. (AP Photo/Nathan Rapheld)
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Interactive America On Guard The Homeland Security Department, the terror alert system, preparedness quiz and more.
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Authorities in Michigan and Ohio clearly listened: In the space of only a few days last week, they arrested five men and charged them with terrorism-related offenses.
But in the days since, the two cases have grown problematic.
On Monday, an Ohio prosecutor said he was dropping the charges he brought against two men because he could not prove a terrorism link.
And the FBI said Monday it had no information to indicate that three men arrested in Michigan had direct terror ties. The three men were stopped in a van that contained about 1,000 cell phones and photos of the Mackinac Bridge.
Prosecutors in Michigan, however, were standing by the charges against the three Palestinian-American men living in Texas, though they have not said what they believe the men intended to do with the phones.
Officials have said various illegal acts can be committed with prepaid cell phones, including using them as detonators, communicating among terrorists and using the batteries to make methamphetamine.
Tuscola County prosecutors have charged Maruan Awad Muhareb, 18, of Mesquite, Texas; Adham Abdelhamid Othman, 21, of Dallas; and Louai Abdelhamied Othman, 23, of Mesquite, with collecting or providing materials for terrorist acts and surveillance of a vulnerable target for terrorist purposes.
The surveillance charge was connected to photos of the bridge found on their digital camera, but William Kowalski, assistant special agent in charge of the FBI's Detroit office. He said there was no imminent threat to the bridge.
Separately, Michigan State Police Director Col. Peter Munoz, who heads the state's homeland security efforts, said there was no indication the men were plotting to blow up the Mackinac Bridge "or target any other location in Michigan or elsewhere."
The suspects said the cell phone purchases were a business activity in which they resold the phones at a profit.
Their lawyer, Nabih Ayad, told the Detroit News that the men traveled from state to state buying the cell phones because they were more expensive in Texas and because many stores place limits on the number of phones that can be purchased.
"They were in Wisconsin and they drove to the [Upper Penninsula] and then down here," Ayad told the News. "The Mackinac Bridge was an amusement to them. On the camera there's 50 pictures, 20 of the bridge. The rest are a deer, ducks, flowers and trees."
Ayad also said their families in Dallas. were suffering because of the arrests. "People are driving by and yelling, calling them terrorists," he said.
Speaking in Chicago, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales took a different view: "I don't know how many of you have ever gone to a store to purchase 80-100 cell phones at a time. I would consider that somewhat unusual and I think it would be perfectly legitimate to say, 'Hey, is there something going on here?'"
Tuscola County Prosecutor Mark E. Reene, who charged the three men, would not comment on the status of the case. Representatives of his office and Caro police have consulted with officials from the FBI, the Department of Homeland Security and the U.S. attorney's office.
Meanwhile, in Ohio, Washington County Prosecutor James Schneider said he did not have enough evidence to prove that Ali Houssaiky and Osama Sabhi Abulhassan, both of Dearborn, Mich., had any link to terrorism.
The two 20-year-olds still face a misdemeanor charge of falsification — accused of lying about why they bought the phones. Felony charges of money laundering in support of terrorism and soliciting or providing support for acts of terrorism will be dropped, Schneider said.
Houssaiky and Abulhassan were arrested Aug. 8 in Marietta, Ohio, after they aroused suspicions by buying large numbers of prepaid cell phones, officials said.
The Texas men, Muhareb, Adham Othman and Louai Othman, were arrested Friday in Caro after purchasing 80 cell phones at a Wal-Mart, police said. Authorities said they found nearly 1,000 phones in their van.
The FBI and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security sent out joint bulletins in February and March to police departments nationwide warning about the bulk purchase of phones for personal profit or financing terrorism.
©MMVI, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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See all 34 CommentsI bought a new cell phone. It took Cingular, Tmobile and all the cell phone companies almost a year (yes, a year) to offer the phone compared to the world market. I agonized on buying it from australia for about 3 months. It was bought and sold on the ebay, from people who travel to England, Germany and Australia. Just like what these guys were probably doing. You couldn't get your hands on a thousand of the phones using the entire world market to exploit the sales potential. Having that much liguid capital would be hard to come up with for a simple venture. A thousand of my phones, when they were hot would have required 500k to purchase that many of my phone.
Yes, exploiting the special offers, travel around and deplete the dealers stock (no retailer keeps that many type of phones), and reselling at a profit. I can see that. Would you need to hit states that far away, maybe if you have a certain nitch you are exploiting.
Lie about it, sure, don't report the income, and avoid taxes. That is a cash only way to make money.
And people assume they are being terrorist?
point being - THEY LIED
they have "something" to hide..... otherwise "don't lie"...................
the only ones who should be concerned here at all are those with something to hide.....
If that is indeed what they are doing.
They would die just to hurt us. Us Americans. Because we have something they will never have. Freedom lovingness.
They want our cell phones, our bridges, our flowers, and even our fuzzy little deer. They want to kill our deer because they are American. Anything American, they obsess about it day and night. They dress their wives up like American women and force them to quote from "Talledega Nights". That incenses their hatred - deep hatred -- of freedom lovingness. They could never understand what it is like to be a freedom loving people who love democracy. The beauty of it, the wonderful feeling. Yes, I love democracy, hate me if you must, you non-freedom loving people! I love democracy, I tell you! You can hate me, try to wipe me off the map, but you cannot make me choose anti-freedom-lovingness!
It is a clash of civilizations, World War III ,or World War IV, wake up you people! Wake up and protect the little deer!
Bambi
(especially cause they love us so much...)
as well if the general description of the people or peoples who have been and are continuously out to get us was 6'2 and blond haired, then we'd be having this same discussion with the sweedish right now....
it's not our fault that the people who have vowed to die in order to reap havoc upon our society and kill us at ALL costs are of this persuasion
Yet, a terrorist also will want multiple-- as yet unindividualized-- phone numbers from which to switch every few hours. The number used is not yet assigned to a name and address, so it is unknown to the NSA surveillance computer. Further, by installing a special chip, the user can bypass normal controls on even registration of a snigle transmission. This multi-phone juggling is a cruder version of what the US military has done for years-- random switches between multiple frequencies used for a single communication.
The message here is this is a tough "call" to make for law enforcement-- there is both a legitimate profit motive, exactly parallel to a suspect capability for the seller and purchaser. If the van made deliveries of 50 phones each to terror cells in ten US cities, that would be a serious obstacle to tracing the calls. To a terror organization setting up an infrastructure, distribution of these phones would be a critical first step. The only countermeasure would be to cancel the current method of prepaid sales, altogether.
as well if YOU had heard about a group of men who had 1000 cell phones that the police knew about before hand and turned out they were up to no good say to detonate explosives in your region - YOU would undoubtedly be the first to call for the heads of those very law enforcement personel......
if you make it a practice of carrying around 1000 cell phones then I think you or anyone who does should have a problem (unless of course you are a cell phone salesmen then it would be possible however still unlikely) and if you don't then what are you mumbling about? they can already get your conversations if they want.... should we all shriek with fear?? no - not unless you have something to hide otherwise - enjoy your freedom - at least your allowed to have one.... (and can afford it)
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/4117318.html
DALLAS %u2014 The three Dallas-area men arrested in Michigan on state terrorism charges are well-known to cell phone wholesale and retail shops here, where managers said Monday they are part of a brisk trade in buying phones from Wal-Mart and other discount stores and reselling them to smaller shops.
Source: Houston Chronicle
It is getting pretty ridiculous when you can't conduct a business venture without being accused of terrorism. Don't the police have anything better to do than hassle citizens trying to make some money? The Michigan prosecutor is dreaming if he thinks this is going to wash. The judge will dimiss this out of hand.
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