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| Muslims, Chinese-Americans Rally In Defense Of Yee | |
| 2003-11-21 | |
| ( From KOMO TV news site... beware of spin...) Muslim and Chinese-American advocates are calling for the pretrial release of Army Capt. James Yee, a former Muslim chaplain at the Guantanamo Bay prison who is charged with mishandling classified information. A Chinese-American who converted to Islam after graduating from West Point, Yee was arrested Sept. 10 in Jacksonville, Fla., after federal agents said they found him carrying sketches of the military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where he counseled al-Qaida and Taliban prisoners. They also have been watching him for some time to see who he associates with. Agents also said Yee had documents concerning captured Taliban and al-Quaida fighters to whom he had ministered, and their U.S. interrogators. Found at his home. Once a chaplain at Fort Lewis, Wash., Yee was charged Oct. 10 with disobeying a general order by taking classified material home and transporting classified information without proper security containers. The penalty for each charge is two years in prison and military dismissal. Yee is being held at a naval brig in Charleston, S.C. His wife, Huda Suboh, 29, lives in Olympia with the couple’s two young children, and said it has angered her to hear people refer to her husband as an alleged spy. "James wants me to tell you all that he is innocent," Suboh, a Syrian native said, speaking through a translator at a news conference Thursday at the Islamic School of Seattle. "He is going to fight the charges with all his energy." Lies! All Lies! Capt. Tom Crossan, spokesman for U.S. Southern Command, said the decision to detain Yee, who now goes by the first name Yousef, was based on evidence gathered during an ongoing investigation. "Yousef Yee was placed in pretrial confinement because a military magistrate determined he did something that warranted pretrial confinement," Crossan said. Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller, commander of Joint Task Force Guantanamo, will decide whether the evidence warrants an Article 32 hearing, the prelude to a general court-martial. Military speedy-trial rules require that Yee be allowed to enter a plea by Jan. 10. But Miller granted a 45-day delay last month, pushing the hearing back until late February or early March. Yee’s Washington, D.C.-based attorney, Eugene Fidell, called the length of detainment allowed in his client’s case "a complete disgrace." Advocates for several humanitarian groups, including the Organization of Chinese Americans, Justice for New Americans and the Hate Free Zone Campaign of Washington, are speaking out in Yee’s defense. What? No Hate Free Zone of Iran or Hate Free Zone of Syria? Damn.. this suprise meter must be broken again.... "Captain Yee has already been tried and convicted in the media before there were even charges brought against him," said Samia El-Moslimany, vice chairwoman of the Seattle chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations. "He was basically branded as a spy and a traitor to his country. We think this is happening because he’s Muslim and Chinese-American." No. Its because he took home CLASSIFIED DOCUMENTS. Yee’s parents, Fong and Joseph, who live in New Jersey, prepared a statement that was read at the news conference: "James is not a threat to America. He is loyal to America. He is loyal to the Army."
carrying classified documents. He’s charged with lying to federal agents by denying computer discs he was carrying had classified information from Guantanamo on them. He has pleaded innocent. | |
| Posted by:CrazyFool |
| #2 Support shouldn't be held against them. After conviction, their blind racial support and anti-american activities can be used to tell them to STFU...of course, this hasn't worked on CAIR, but we can always hope. Credibility should matter, shouldn't it? |
| Posted by: Frank G 2003-11-21 11:30:32 PM |
| #1 Organization of Chinese Americans I guess this is the Chinese equivalent of CAIR and the other terrorist-supporting Muslim organizations. I bet they think Wen Ho Lee is innocent, too. |
| Posted by: Zhang Fei 2003-11-21 10:31:28 PM |