Is Owning 1,000 Cell Phones Terrorism?

Serious Questions Arise About Arrest Of 3 Palestinian-Americans

(CBS/AP)  Last winter, federal authorities warned local officials to be on the lookout for anyone buying large numbers of prepaid cell phones — devices that could become potential tools for terrorists.

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.

[marybethinct]

And why do we allow these people to live among us?
Deport them and their famlies that will send a clear message. 0 tollerance

[robbinstratt]

Is the FBI aware of the large concentrations of Middle Eastern people in the Coldwater, Michigan area? If so, are they being monitored for possible terrorist activity?

[sierrapac]

Don't forget David Koresh, Jim Jones, and Eric Rudolph. From these expamples we can assume that ALL Christians are a threat to National Security. Should we deport them all back to their countries? Or is this their contry too?

[randyrba]

These are not Palestinian-Americans, these are just Palestinains. David Koresh, Jim Jones, Eric Rudolph and Tim McVeigh (Christians) are all dead, except Rudolph (which may as well be dead). These guys should be in the great melting pot of hell with them if they are convicted in a court of law.

[sierrapac]

My grandfather emigrated to the U.S. from Palestine prior to WWI. He joined the U.S. Army and served in Europe, where he lost his hearing from artillery. My father and his five brothers were raised in Provo, Utah and ALL served in the Military (one currently in Military Intelligence). My grandfather is described as being %u201Cultra patriotic%u201D and was very proud that all of his sons served our country. Being of Arab decent does not automatically make one a terrorist, nor should it make one a terrorist suspect. If any of these Palestinian-Americans are convicted of planning a terrorist act they should hang from the highest tree in the land. (Louai Othman is said to have been born in Dallas, making him an American citizen of Palestinian decent).

[bostonblakie-2009]

Let's face it..........the vast majority of terrorist whack jobs fall into the young, middle eastern, male category. Yeah, a 70 year old grandma from Hawkins Falls could be plotting something but what are the chances? Talk to a bookie & get the odds. Better wake up or you might have to pay the price!

[lgugliel]

Yeah! Why do these people live among us? I think we should deport everyone but the Native Americans. Who needs "them dern ferriners" anywho?

[brm13]

Ok -- stop me if I wasted all this time studying engineer and such but just what does 1000 cell phones have to do with blowing up a bridge. Certainly they can be used as a detonator, but so can most anything one buys in the electronic section at Wally world.

Why would you buy 1000 detonators?? Does anyone stop to ask the simple questions?? Guessing it's election time again.

[brm13]

The AP is reporting That there is no link that the FBI can't find a link. But it is good pr on the part of the government to get you folks all shook up.

[camarogirl17]

There are a large concentration of middle eastern people in the coldwater area also a "training camp" south of town if you will, I left the area b/c it is getting really scarey how our government ISNT protecting us and allowing this to go on. ITS TIME that we as AMERICANS stood up and took OUR country back. Stop letting them tread on us and take our jobs. STAND UP AMERICA

[visionep-2009]

Three Guy's buying 1,000 cell phones. Where did these kids get the money for the cell phones? I think that is the vital piece of information that this report is lacking.

These might be honest guy's trying to make some money. Or they might be bag men for much smarter mobsters(terrorists) that are plotting to do some real damage and figured it would look less conspicuous to purchase a huge number of these phones and say they intend on being resalers as opposed to purchasing the 20 phones they need and looking really obvious.

As far as profiling is concerned, it always worries me when anyone actively separates their community from the rest of the society that they live in. I think all small groups that hold to their un-American customs and practices should be scrutinized with an additional amount of focus.

After another 100 years if our society adjusts to integrate these people in, and their society adjusts to be integrated then no-one will see anything to profile and we'll be one big happy family. But until then devout muslims, devout David Koresh followers, devout anti-technology people (uni-bomber), and any other crazy people that want to stay separate from normal society should be scrutinized, even if it hurts their feelings.

[kaypheonix]

What happened to the land of the BRAVE...How pathetic are we becoming...to the person saying deport everyone but the Native Americans...are you serious?? We all have foreign blood in our veins..get over yourself..
come on people, there are so many other things we should be freaking out about. Like why is Bush sending our brother, sisters, sons and daughters to be slaughtered in a war that 60+% of us dont even believe in....2500 innocent lives lost in a "my johnson's bigger than yours" contest...why are so many of our troops overseas that the real threat is if something does go down in America are we even prepared to battle..why are *** offenders killing and raping our children...why are we so morally bankrupt we allow our little girls to idolize a sexually charged group like the "pussycat dolls"?? why are we so morally lost that pastors and teachers are into child porn?? dont we have enough *** to worry about as it is..why is exxon allowed to make billions in profit when alot of us are chosing between feeding our kids and getting gas to take them to school...lets give ourselves more credit than being the idiots the WhiteHouse takes us for....A divided house CANNOT stand..if everytime the white house says something we go freak out then we are forgeting what America stands for...Bravery, Unity, Victory...

[invirginia]

I say, where there's smoke there's fire. Is everybody out there in denial? Our enemies are still trying to KILL us. Don't forget that, and pay attention to weird things. Please.

[voxguy49203]

Forget the fact that the gentlemen in these incidents (Ohio and Michigan) are of Arabic decent. Let's deal with the fact that they were buying cell phones en-masse in an odd manner. And they have said they are doing it to resell them for profit.

Lets suppose they ARE buying these phones for resale. With every Wally Mart selling them for $20, why would someone go to these 'entrepeneurial-minded' men to buy a phone for more money (they said their supposed resale price was $38)? Wouldn't it make more sense to purchase these phones from the distributor for what Wally's pays for them, then sell them at a more competitive price so that they could compete and possibly beat Wally's best deal?

Let's suppose these men want to make money reselling these phones to be successfull entrepenuers, and not for any 'terrorist plot' scenerio. And they drove to Michigan because they were 'all sold out' of the phones in Texas. Wouldn't purchasing all the gas to get from Texas to Michigan eat into their profit margin? Why not just go on eBay to get them, save the gas money, and make a better profit overall? Or like above, cut out the 'middle man' and be distributors for the manufacturer themselves?

[lou70433]

Tiptoeing around the obvious for the sake of political correctness is going to cost the U.S. a lot of innocent lives.

The terrorists, who are throwbacks to the 14th century, are bent on world domination. If you have any doubts, consider their activities in India, Indonesia, Phillipines, Sudan and Somalia.

The silence of the "moderate" Islamic community is deafening.

[brm13]

Ok so it turns out that the airplane passenger lists are old left int eh car by a relative who works for the airlines, and the guys just resell them to make money. Capitolism at its best. So why does Fox news tell us every five minutes that these guys were going to blow up a bridge. Fear Mongering at its finest!!

[jasperrdm]

First one guy looks like a guy i had in class in high school and the other looks like a son of a co-worker. Change the names they fit in here in Al. Also don't be to uptight about the stupid business plan. I seen grunts day after pay day blow money on deals like this. Since it happen at Walmart, I was shopping there years ago, I saw a guy with great silver dragon medallion. I comment him on. He offer to sell to for $70 right now but he got for $40 at the Silver store. So it only a stupid idea if no one buys.

[sharncedar]

but of course the interesting question is why 1000 is more exciting and scary to red state folks than say 10 cell phones. It is hard to imagine in a practical sense what one does that is delicious and wicked with 1000 cell phones. Perhaps puts them in a big box and throws the box at the mysterious "bridge" of which there are photos. Perhaps one extracts terrible fluids from the batteries that alter genetic material. Perhaps one uses them to tie up the network switching of the local mobile provider by making 1000 simultaneous calls. If only we knew it would be fun, but as every red state yokum knows, we cannot ever understand the minds of these people, they are bent on world domination, who can fathom such a thing.

[clestes-2009]

Since when is it a crime to buy multiples of an item at a cheap price and then resell for a profit? Or taking pictures of a bridge. I hardly think a person can fix a bomb to blow up a bridge without detailed photos. How detailed were these photos? Did they show the bridge supports closeup? I have a better question. Would they have been arrested if they had been white and did not has middle east names?

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.

[bodmass]

These people aren't just claiming to be nothing more than 'buy cheap - sell expensive', good ol' American businessmen. But they are actually known to be!

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

[random_radar]

What most concerns me is the nature of the laws being used to prosecute these men. According to those laws, all of us can be defined as terrorists at the whim of government officials. There is no proof that the cell phones are going to be used for terrorism--but it is against the law to buy an item that could be used for terrorism. I own a cell phone with a battery, therefore I could be accused of being a terrorist under these laws. Don't think that would happen? If you make an enemy of someone politically connected, it certainly could. Just because you think you have nothing to fear today doesn't mean it won't change tomorrow--especially if we as a nation accept these laws.

[tellitasitis]

random_radar

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)

[tellitasitis]

is it a crime to be alert of the current situation and is it a crime for our appointed law enforcement officals to do their job which INCLUDES to investigate anything out of the ordinary (which possessing 1000 cell phones is a little "out of the ordinary") if you have nothing to hide - you have nothing to hide.....

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......

[jimkun]

Don't forget! These terrorists were also planning on blowing up deer, ducks, flowers and trees. We have PROOF. It was on their digital cameras! Wake up everyone. Everyone is out to get us! We have to protect our American freedoms by sending them down to Guantanimo! That way, no need to waste time on a trial!

[alphaa10-2009]

The old profiling issue raises its multiple heads, once again. Sure, a legit businessman will multiply profit with every good deal he makes on a mobile phone. So, why not buy 1,000 and truck them everywhere? These guys are like door-to-door salesmen, and what they spend on tires and gas, they save on UPS and FEDEX.

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.

[tellitasitis]

yeah - no how about we just tell ALL our law enforcement people to just love everyone they see - not to worry about anyone driving large vehicle full of cow *** - not to worry about anyone boarding a plane with any kinda liquid at all cause we just love you all - let's see how far that gets us

(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

[sharncedar]

"the people who have vowed to die in order to reap havoc upon our society and kill us at ALL costs"

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

[jetsmustang]

people complaining about profiling,WOW...imagine that! if a black guy walks down the street dressed like a thug, everyone assumes he,s dealing drugs...a white guy with a shaved head is in some eyes is a racsist..THIS IS HUMAN NATURE FOLKS !! for more than two decades now we have been bombarded with immages of middle eastern warfair,these people aginst those,those aginst these..it goes on and on.. did everyone forget about IRAN taking ameerican hostiges in the late 70's..GIVE law enforcement a break people!! thier doing what we asked them to do, protect our families,our freedoms,our country!!!

[smooth551]

I can understand their motive for buying and selling the phones: profit. What I don't understand is why the three mne have to travel from Texas to Ohio to buy these phones. I am sure there are Wal Marts in Texas they could purchase these phones. Then they would see an increase in their profits rather than going out of the state to purchase them.

If that is indeed what they are doing.

[alice_tomlin]

There are stores here in CT that limit the number of cell phone sales. Specifically for those non traceable trac phone type of phones. I think it is their way to prevent drug dealers and other criminals from using them and easily throwing them away. One thousand phones? Who needs that many? There is certainly something very suspicious about it. It would be good to investigate something like that. Maybe we need some kind of laws enacted, but maybe something reasonable that won't violate individual rights or send someone off to Guantanamo.

[diamondp50]

If it looks, walks, and quacks like a duck then it probably is a duck... I wouldn't believe anything these guys say. We have been lied to before and we will be lied to again, and you can believe we will be attacked again.. I say keep a real close eye on these guys.. Oh and for all you people out there that say the USA is "racial profiling" you...then you should go back home to the country that took out the Twin Towers... how do you expect us to trust you? We are a caring and civilized country, but we aren't stupid!!

[diamondp50]

If it looks, walks, and quacks like a duck then it probably is a duck... I wouldn't believe anything these guys say. We have been lied to before and we will be lied to again, and you can believe we will be attacked again.. I say keep a real close eye on these guys.. Oh and for all you people out there that say the USA is "racial profiling" you...then you should go back home to the country that took out the Twin Towers... how do you expect us to trust you? We are a caring and civilized country, but we aren't stupid!!

[diamondp50]

If it looks, walks, and quacks like a duck then it probably is a duck... I wouldn't believe anything these guys say. We have been lied to before and we will be lied to again, and you can believe we will be attacked again.. I say keep a real close eye on these guys.. Oh and for all you people out there that say the USA is "racial profiling" you...then you should go back home to the country that took out the Twin Towers... how do you expect us to trust you? We are a caring and civilized country, but we aren't stupid!!

[tellitasitis]

besides - if you read what has been said, these guys initially LIED about their actual names LIED about the "purpose" of the phones.....

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.....

[the_TT]

here goes nothing. Some of these posts, are just plain out of line.

I 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?