May 31, 2005

Al Qaeda Lawyer: "My client was set up."

He must have been set up. There is no way in the world that a Muslim, a doctor, a family man, or a jazz musician could ever be a terrorist sympathizer.

Newsweek:

A lawyer for a jazz bassist from the Bronx who was charged in a terror case today claimed his client and a co-defendant arrested in Florida had been ensnared in a trap set by government investigators.

"It's a sting operation," Anthony Ricco, a lawyer for Tarik Shah, 42, told reporters after Shah appeared before a federal magistrate in Manhattan and was ordered held without bail.

Ricco noted that the investigation had been going on for two years. "It makes me wonder if somebody was a threat to our national security, why did it take two years?" Ricco said.

Handcuffed during the proceeding, he at one point turned and smiled at his wife, Zakkiyyah, and a group of about a dozen other supporters in the courtroom.

Among his supporters were other musicians who said they had often played with Shah.

Outside of court in Florida, spokesman Dan McBride of the Islamic Center of Boca Raton defended Sabir as a man who frequently traveled between the United States and Saudi Arabia to earn enough money to support his wife and their two sons.

And what kind of man is The Islamic Center of Boca Raton defending here?

An 18-page complaint unsealed Monday repeatedly described Shah's zest to train "brothers" for urban warfare. It alleged both men pledged their allegiance to al-Qaida during a May 20 meeting in the Bronx.

Shah went with an informant to a windowless Long Island warehouse to see if the location would be adequate as a training site, unaware FBI agents were secretly videotaping the visit, the papers said.

Shah went with an informant to a windowless Long Island warehouse to see if the location would be adequate as a training site, unaware FBI agents were secretly videotaping the visit, the papers said.

He discussed a desire to open a machine shop to make weapons so fellow enthusiasts would not have to rely on anyone else to get guns, the complaint said.

"Shah indicated that his 'greatest cover has been' his career as a 'professional' jazz musician," wrote Brian Murphy, the FBI agent who prepared the complaint.

At one point, the informant told Shah he was going to take him to Plattsburgh, N.Y., to introduce him to an undercover FBI agent posing as a recruiter from the Middle East.

Murphy said Shah was eager to introduce Sabir -- a "very, very, very close friend" he had known for more than 20 years -- to the recruiter.

Shah also discussed a desire to start a martial arts school only for Muslims and said he hoped to be trained in chemicals, explosives, firearms, AK-47 assault rifles and hand grenades, the complaint said. The defendant allegedly discussed martyrdom with the informant, saying he and Sabir had been persecuted for many years.