A federal grand jury has handed up new indictments charging two leaders of an area...Let Me guess. Synagogue? Fundamentalist Christian church? Bhuddist temple?
...mosque with conspiring to support terrorists, the U.S. Attorney said Thursday.
Well, knock Me over with a feather.
The superseding indictment returned Thursday also charges Yassin Aref and Mohammed Hossain with attempting to provide support to Jaish-e-Mohammed, an Islamic extremist group based in Pakistan that is on the State Department's list of designated foreign terrorist organizations. Aref also was charged with making a false statement when he answered "none" to an immigration question asking him to list any organizations to which he had belonged. He also was charged with making false statements to the FBI when he was arrested in August 2004 and denied he was a member of the Islamic Movement in Kurdistan. At the time, he also denied knowing Mullah Krekar, believed to be the founder of Ansar-al-Islam, a radical Islamic fundamentalist group.
Aref, 35, who is the imam of the Masjid As-Salam mosque, and 50-year-old Hossain, a founder of the Albany mosque, have been free on $250,000 bond since shortly after their arrest in August 2004. Each originally was charged with money laundering and supporting terrorism. They were arrested after a yearlong FBI sting using an undercover informant.
The initial 19-count indictment accused them of working with an FBI informant who posed as a part-time arms dealer and proposed that Hossain hold money from the sale of a shoulder-fired missile that would be used to kill a Pakistani diplomat in New York City. Aref, who witnessed the financial transactions and wrote receipts, has said he knew nothing about any missile. An FBI photo shows the informant holding a missile launcher while Hossain watched. Hossain said later he didn't think it was real.
"There are really no new facts here," said Terence Kindlon, the lawyer for Aref. "It's based on the same old facts."
They haven't reached their expiration date yet.
He said he doesn't know why the new indictment was issued. He had not yet read the indictment. "The charge of providing material assistance to a terrorist organization is legally a slightly more serious charge than the original," Kindlon said. "It could require that the judge revoke the bail that was previously set for Aref."