Four men standing trial at the State Security Court (SSC) accused of plotting to attack Americans in the Kingdom on Monday retracted their confessions claiming they were extracted under duress. The four defendants, Loui H., 25, Hamdi A., 23, Mohammad H., 24, and Mohammad O., 26, claim they were threatened by security forces into confessing to the plot. Two other defendants, Osama A. and Haitham A., are being tried in absentia on the same charges. One of the defendants, Mohammad O., said he was denied access to a lawyer during his interrogation. According to the charge sheet, Loui H. decided to attack Americans in the Kingdom after attending religious classes in early 2005 in the Hitteen refugee camp, located between Amman and Zarqa. The prosecution claims he then proposed the idea to the rest of the defendants, who were all friends, and they agreed. The defendants at first decided to attack liquor stores and bars by placing cyanide on the doorknobs to kill people frequenting these premises, the charge sheet said. But the defendants were unable to find cyanide on the Jordanian market and instead decided to attack Americans using machineguns, the charge sheet added. Hamdi A. suggested killing Americans who frequented a hotel in the capital, “since he was employed there and it was easy for him to befriend these Americans and lure them outside the hotel where they would be killed by the rest of the group.” The defendants also suggested attacking bars in Amman and a bar in one of the major hotels in Aqaba, “since one of the defendants used to be an employee there and still owned an access card to that hotel,” said the charge sheet.
The men suggested naming themselves “Khatab Brigades” and purchased a machinegun to accomplish their alleged plans, according to the charge sheet. Some of them travelled to Saudi Arabia and received training from Osama A. and Haitham A., according to the charge sheet. However, the first four defendants were arrested in Jordan in September 2005 before being able to accomplish any of their alleged plans, according to the charge sheet.