One of the Muslims accused in an FBI anti-terrorism sting in Albany has asked the judge to grant him a bail hearing so he can return to work and take care of his family until his trial later this year. Bail was revoked in September for Yassin Aref, 35, imam of Masjid as-Salam in Albany. Muhammad Hussain, 50, an Albany pizzeria owner and mosque member, remains free on bond. They have denied allegations that they conspired to provide support to Jaish-e-Muhammad, a Pakistan-based group listed by the federal government as a terrorist organization. After a recent hearing, defense attorney Terence Kindlon said Aref is in Rensselear County Jail where he is being kept in solitary confinement 23 hours a day. Aref, writing directly to US District Court Judge Thomas McAvoy on Jan. 16, said that he has four small children, his wife isn’t well, he was the only one with a job and “whatever they claimed when they said no bail is not true.” The federal court clerk forwarded the letter this week to Kindlon, saying McAvoy does not intend to act on Aref’s request and recommending he advise his client to make future requests through the attorney.
Entered as new evidence against Aref in September were entries in his personal journals, shortly after he arrived in the United States in 1999 with his family as refugees from their homeland in the Kurdish region of northern Iraq. Prosecutors say the journals show that Aref, while working in Syria for the Islamic Movement in Kurdistan in the late 1990s, knew Mullah Krekar. Krekar later founded Ansar al-Islam, a terrorist group that US authorities contend has ties to al-Qaida and has been responsible for attacks on American forces in the Middle East. Aref and Hussain are accused of laundering money for an FBI informant posing as a businessman and arms dealer. Neither is accused of actual violence.