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The Herald Massachusetts - June 08, 2005
Focus of Al-Arian trial turns to 1995 FBI searches
TAMPA, Fla. - FBI agents testified Wednesday that they seized numerous boxes of documents and other evidence in a 1995 raid of a University of South Florida professor's home and offices, evidence that federal prosecutors say supports charges that he aided Palestinian terrorists.
Agents testified that they raided Sami Al-Arian's home, his office at the university and the offices of the World and Islam Studies Enterprise, a think tank founded by Al-Arian, on Nov. 20, 1995.
They seized computers, letters, photos, video tapes, financial records, bills, mailing labels and other evidence that federal prosecutors are now using to build their case against Al-Arian and three co-defendants in a trial expected to last at least six months.
One agent introduced many of the documents that prosecutors hope will help convince jurors that Al-Arian and the others conspired to raise money in the United States to further the mission of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a State Department-listed terrorist organization blamed for more than 100 deaths in Israel, the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
The evidence included letters written by Ramadan Abdullah Shallah, a former USF instructor and researcher at the think tank who left Tampa and emerged later as the commander of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad in Damascus, Syria. Other documents established the link between other defendants and the think tank.
Al-Arian, 47, and the others face a 53-count indictment that includes charges of providing material support to terrorists, racketeering and conspiracy. Five other men, including Shallah, were indicted but haven't been arrested….
Besides the evidence gathered in the searches, the government built its case around a decade of wiretapped telephone calls and faxes beginning in late 1993 or early 1994…
http://www.bradenton.com/mld/bradenton/news/local/11845963.htm
The Tampa Tribune - June 9, 2005
Testimony in Al-Arian trial begins with a few yawns
By MICHAEL FECHTER and ELAINE SILVESTRINI
TAMPA - After two days of intense talk about international terrorist conspiracies and challenges to the First Amendment, the first witness in the terror-support trial of former University of South Florida Professor Sami Al-Arian proved to be a downer.
Timothy Shavers, of the Department of Homeland Security, spent Tuesday afternoon walking jurors through an alphabet soup of immigration forms.
A few jurors nodded off until Assistant U.S. Attorney Terry Zitek moved the testimony to applications Al-Arian submitted to bring a number of people into the country.
``And you were wondering how this trial could possibly last six months?'' joked U.S. District Judge James Moody.
Prosecutors seemed to be laying a foundation by showing how members of the alleged conspiracy came together. Some charges deal with immigration violations.
The indictment accuses Al- Arian of lying repeatedly, including a claim that he didn't know the full identity of Ramadan Abdullah Shallah, who has run the Palestinian Islamic Jihad since late 1995. When Shallah was appointed, Al-Arian said he only knew him as Ramadan Abdullah. Immigration papers submitted in 1993 show that was not true…..
http://www.tampatrib.com/MGB6Q3B2P9E.html
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