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Terror case in jury's hands(Sacramento Bee, The (CA) (KRT) Via Thomson Dialog NewsEdge) Apr. 13--A 23-year-old Lodi cherry packer charged with supporting terrorism "had a jihadi heart and a jihadi mind," a prosecutor said Wednesday in his closing argument to a federal court jury in Sacramento. In other words, Hamid Hayat aspired to be a holy warrior who would wage war against the United States as an enemy of Islam, according to Assistant U.S. Attorney S. Robert Tice-Raskin. Hayat's attorney, Wazhma Mojaddidi, countered in her closing argument that the government's entire case depended on proving her client attended a terrorist training camp and "none of the evidence proves it." The arguments capped dual nine-week terrorism trials of Hayat and his father, Umer Hayat, a 48-year-old ice cream truck driver, also from Lodi. Tice-Raskin on Wednesday methodically ticked off the evidence he and two colleagues had presented to the jury sitting in judgment on Hamid Hayat, saying that five essential facts had been proved: One, that the younger Hayat was drawn to jihad long before he met FBI paid informant Naseem Khan in August 2002, and made damaging admissions to Khan in secretly taped conversations. Two, that Hayat pledged to go to jihad training at a camp in Pakistan. Three, that he attended such a camp sometime between the fall of 2003 and the fall of 2004. Four, that he knew the training would prepare him to engage in violent acts in the United States. Five, that he attempted to conceal his conduct and intended conduct by lying to the FBI. Mojaddidi countered that the only evidence of Hayat's attendance at a camp was his confession to FBI agents in videotaped interviews on June 4 and June 5. And, she argued, there were so many inconsistencies and nonsensical statements in the interviews that they were worthless. "The government is left with nothing," she told the jury. The interviews were also riddled with leading questions, Mojaddidi argued, and when the agents could not get Hayat to give them the answer they wanted, they chose not to believe him. After nearly a full day of closing arguments and instructions on the law from U.S. District Judge Garland E. Burrell Jr., the jury of six men and six women began its deliberations at 3:50 p.m. The jurors adjourned at 4:30 p.m. and will continue considering the evidence at 9 a.m. today. Another jury will hear closing arguments today in the case against Hayat's father, Umer Hayat, who also eventually confessed to FBI agents. He is charged with initially lying to the FBI about his knowledge of his son's terrorist activities and about his own firsthand knowledge of terrorist training camps in his native Pakistan. Hamid Hayat is charged with the more serious crime of providing material support to international terrorism by undergoing jihad training. He is also charged with lying to the FBI when he initially denied going to a training camp. The younger Hayat is an elementary school dropout who lived with his maternal grandparents in Pakistan between 1990 and 2000. In a June 7 search of the Hayat home in Lodi, a scrapbook Hamid Hayat began assembling in 1999 was seized. Tice-Raskin cited it Wednesday as an important piece of evidence because "it gives us insight into his jihadi mindset." For example, the scrapbook contains articles on protests of the arrest of a well-known Pakistani religious leader aligned with extremist elements. The articles warn that if he is not released, there is a potential for acts of violence against the government of Pakistan, the United States and their citizens. The articles describe the United States as "the biggest terrorist and an enemy of Islam," express support for Osama bin Laden and the Taliban, and warn of dire consequences should the United States attack Afghanistan. Tice-Raskin also reminded the jury that, in recorded conversations with Khan in 2003, Hayat "let his guard down, spoke openly to his 'best friend,' and professed his belief in violent jihad." In these conversations, "you see the real face of Hamid Hayat," the prosecutor told the jury. But Mojaddidi challenged Khan's credibility, arguing that he "was lying to the FBI from the very first time he met with them." She cited Khan's identification of three of the world's most wanted terrorists as men he saw in and around the Muslim mosque in Lodi when Khan lived there in the late 1990s. The prosecution acknowledged there was nothing to support Khan's story, but passed it off as an honest case of mistaken identity. "Where is the evidence that he lied?" prosecutor David Deitch asked the jury in his rebuttal argument. The FBI found Khan "to be consistently reliable and truthful," he said. Besides, Deitch argued, Mojaddidi's point did not address the taped conversations, which he said spoke for themselves. Khan, 32, was seen by Hayat as "older, cooler," Mojaddidi said, and when Khan turned the talk to jihadi training camps, "of course Hamid goes along." In taped telephone conversations after Hayat went to Pakistan in April 2003, Khan urged Hayat to go to a training camp and, when it didn't happen, Khan berated Hayat for wasting time. "Naseem Khan becomes frustrated because, in order to keep his job, he needs Hamid to say he went to a camp," Mojaddidi argued. But Deitch said the Hayat matter was not the only investigation for which Khan was being paid and his employment by the FBI did not depend solely on that case. Mojaddidi argued that all the talk between Khan and her client regarding training was about Hayat's desire to attend a madrassah, or religious school, while in Pakistan. Deitch noted that Khan and Hayat discussed the rigorous nature of the training and how it could not be done in the intense heat of Pakistani summers but could easily be accomplished in the winter months. "Unless they were talking about the rigorous nature of religious training, what else could they have been talking about other than jihadi training?" the prosecutor asked. Hayat "delighted in violence" in his conversations with Khan, according to Deitch. He said that element of their talks was "not mere political discourse." Tice-Raskin earlier cited the exchange between the informant and Hayat on the subject of Daniel Pearl, a Wall Street Journal reporter who was lured to a 2002 meeting in the southern Pakistani port city of Karachi, where he was abducted and eventually beheaded. "They killed him," Hayat had said to Khan. "So, I'm pleased about that. They cut him into pieces and sent him back. "That was a good job they did. Now they can't send one Jewish person to Pakistan." Tice-Raskin asked the jury, "What kind of person would express this belief about the brutal murder and mutilation of another human being?" |