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Home Front: WoT

Man sentenced in money transfer to Yemen

2006-12-02

BUFFALO, N.Y. A man was sentenced to five years in prison Thursday for running an unlicensed money-transfer business that sent $5 million to Yemen. Mohamed Albanna of Lackawanna arranged the transfers from his Buffalo cigarette and candy wholesale business from 1999 to 2002.

U.S. Attorney Terrance Flynn said authorities did not allege that money transferred by the business went to support terrorism but could not rule it out. Albanna, along with a brother and nephew, were arrested in December 2002, after the arrests of six other Yemeni-American men from Lackawanna who admitted to attending a terrorist training camp in Afghanistan. One of the "Lackawanna Six" used the unlicensed business to send $1,500 to Kamal Derwish in March 2002, according to a ledger investigators took from the business. Derwish is believed to have been killed by a CIA missile strike in Yemen later that year.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Timothy Lynch outlined other transactions that he said would have triggered alarms at legitimate money-transfer businesses. But with no paper trail, investigators hit a dead end, he said. Albanna, a leader in Buffalo's Arab-American community, has said the money was sent from Yemeni-Americans in the United States to relatives back home. "My intention was always to assist my fellow man," he told U.S. District Judge William Skretny.

Posted by:Fred

#5 You're welcome, gentlemen. :-)

It sounds like Mr. Derwish was running a simple hawala thingy, a traditional Muslim non-bank money transference set-up, often involving family members at both ends. I b'lieve that's illegal altogether in the U.S. if a certain money level is crossed (prob'ly $10,000 total transactions or something), irrespective of whether or not any of the handled funds were transferred to terrorists or terror organizations.... Just as mobsters are convicted of not paying the proper taxes on their ill-gotten gains.

Posted by: trailing wife 2006-12-02 12:48

#4 Thanks for update TW. Yes, cesspools all...Dearborn,Lackawanna, and apparently Minneapolis. These are out of control. We can't let these cancer pits gain credence in upending American traditions. The Muzzies must be thrown out. There can be no accomodation given.

Posted by: SpecOp35 2006-12-02 11:23

#3 Trailing thanks for the news on the ground. The background information is so darn important in the Burg. Be it bad news.

Posted by: Icerigger 2006-12-02 08:48

#2 The Yeminis grow ever bolder in Lackawanna. We were in Lackawanna/Buffalo for Thanksgiving -- Mr. Wife comes from Lackawanna, home of the long-shuttered Bethlehem Steel plant, I from the university suburb on the other side of town. My darling mother-in-law reports that the high school boys' soccer team was shut down mid-season because the Yemeni lads were in the habit of egregiously abusing their kafir opponents -- spitting, gouging, shouted abuse -- the school superintendent finally put his foot down. Next year they get a three-year probation, but in the meantime lots of claims that college scholarships were lost, etc (yeah, right -- Lackawanna has never been that kind of academic haven). The school has a prayer room now, and Christmas has been banished into the mists of history. And my darling mother-in-law and the friend she goes walking with several mornings a week continue to be pushed off the sidewalk by hijab-coiffed Yemeni women, who do so with malice aforethought.

Posted by: trailing wife 2006-12-02 08:26

#1 But with no paper trail, investigators hit a dead end,

They knew this was completely illegal and hid the end landing. This had clear implication of Muslim terrorism. So why are these Moozlimbs even allowed in the West?

Posted by: Icerigger 2006-12-02 07:55

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