On Sun, 29 Oct 2000 16:01:08 -0500, "Imad-ad-Dean Ahmad" <ahmad@minaret.org> wrote:
-----Original Message-----
From: Dr. Sami A. Al-Arian [mailto:alarian@usf.edu]
Sent: Sunday, October 29, 2000 9:02 AM
To: alarian@usf.edu
Subject: The Tampa Tribune 10/29/00: Al-Najjar may soon be freed
The Tampa Tribune Oct 29, 2000 - 01:20 AM
Al-Najjar may soon be freed
TAMPA - A Palestinian academic who has been held for three years on secret evidence will go free in two weeks unless the government asks for a chance to prove in a private hearing that he's a threat to national security. U.S. Immigration Judge R. Kevin McHugh gave federal prosecutors until Nov. 10 to say whether they will present classified evidence to him against Mazen Al-Najjar, who led an Islamic think tank affiliated with the University of South Florida.
Otherwise, the judge said in a ruling on Friday, Al-Najjar will be released from jail.
``It's a tremendous victory for our client,'' said David Cole, an attorney for Al- Najjar and a law professor at Georgetown University.
``He has now shown himself to be innocent and unjustly detained. That should mean he should be a free man, and it's a first for him in becoming a free man. And I think he will be a free man.''
McHugh presided over a detention hearing earlier this month in Bradenton.
He said that, based on the public-record evidence presented by the government, he found no reason to conclude Al-Najjar was a security threat.
Prosecutors had said they would present classified evidence privately to the judge should McHugh decide the government's public evidence was not strong enough.
``The INS has continued to detain my client based solely on undisclosed information presented to the judge behind closed doors in 1977, never revealed to Dr. Al-Najjar, nor to his attorneys,'' said Martin Schwartz, another of Al-Najjar's attorneys.
``There is no evidence that Dr. Al-Najjar is a threat to anyone,'' Schwartz said.
He said that the family of Al- Najjar is confident he will be released before Christmas, even if the INS presses forward with the case.
This month's hearing was ordered last summer by a federal judge in Miami who ruled that Al- Najjar's rights were violated when he was first detained.
Al-Najjar has never been charged with a crime.
He and his brother-in-law, Sami Al-Arian, headed World and Islam Studies Enterprises, an Islamic think tank affiliated with the University of South Florida.
Al-Najjar was a member of the Islamic Committee for Palestine, a charity and education group headed by Al-Arian.
The organizations were founded in the late 1980s and early 1990s, the early years of the Palestinian uprising in the Mideast's occupied territories.
In 1995, former WISE director Ramadan Shallah became the head of a radical, anti-Israel group called the Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
INS attorneys told the court earlier this month that the Islamic Committee for Palestine and Al-Arian were once introduced at a conference as an ``active arm'' of the terrorist Jihad.
They said that Al-Najjar and Al- Arian used their research institute to bring a ``who's who'' of terrorists into the United States.
``The fact remains that the court has not been presented with any evidence linking [Al Najjar] to the PIJ,'' McHugh said in his ruling.
Despite numerous discrepancies by Al-Najjar about his financial dealings, the judge said the INS's claim that he was engaged in fundraising activities for the Jihad through WISE or ICP were unsupported by the evidence.
McHugh said he found no evidence to prove Al-Najjar was ``meaningfully associated'' with the Jihad.
``It is obvious the government's case is based purely on guilt by association,'' Schwartz said.
``Any secret evidence to be presented by the government is sure to be unreliable and hearsay,'' he said.
Cole said the lawyers will press the government to hand over a summary of the classified evidence before prosecutors meet with the judge to make their case.
Cole said the summary has to be detailed enough ``to maintain his due process.''
``I am skeptical that there is a way to present evidence behind closed doors and preserve the immigrant's right to defend himself,'' Cole said.
A former colleague of Al-Najjar's at the University of South Florida was optimistic about Al- Najjar's release after hearing the news.
``It's about time,'' said Jamil Jreisat, a professor of public administration and political science at USF.
``It's unheard of in the American system of justice that a man would be held on unspecified charges.''
Jose Patio Girona contributed to this report.
Tribune researcher Diane Grey contributed to this report.