| Submit your comments on this article |
| Home Front: WoT |
| Overturned convictions in Muslim charity case draw contrasting reactions |
| 2008-06-09 |
| The decision last week by a federal judge to overturn convictions on the most serious charges against three officials of a defunct Muslim charity has been met with sharply different reactions. There is dismay by those who believe, contrary to U.S. District Judge F. Dennis Saylor IVÂ’s declaration in court, that the court should support the governmentÂ’s policies, especially a foreign policy designed to thwart terrorism. And there is elation among civil libertarians who see the courtsÂ’ role as stopping a government that is willing to prosecute Muslims even for perceived crimes when it believes they are aiding the countryÂ’s enemies. Judge Saylor, who normally sits in federal court in Worcester, overturned a jury verdict that convicted a Shrewsbury man and two former Worcester men on a charge of conspiracy from 1993 to 2003. The conspiracy charge was to defraud the Internal Revenue Service by concealing information to get tax-exempt status for Care International Inc., a Boston-based Muslim charity. The Justice Department charged that Muhamed Mubayyid of Shrewsbury, Emadeddin Z. Muntasser of Braintree and Samir Al-Monla of Brookline failed to tell the IRS that it supported Islamic holy war and fighters by publishing a pro-jihad newspaper and fundraising. It also alleged that the charity concealed that it was the successor and outgrowth of Al-Kifah Refugee Center, which had been tied in news accounts to the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center. Judge Saylor freed Mr. Al-Monla after acquitting him of the charges on which the jury convicted him and threw out all of the charges against Mr. Muntasser except for lying to an FBI agent in 2003. However, the judge upheld all charges except the conspiracy charge against Mr. Mubayyid. Those charges are concealing material facts from the IRS, impeding the IRS and three counts of filing a false tax return in 1997, 1999 and 2000. |
| Posted by:ryuge |