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Padilla wanted to boom apartment buildings
Former Chicago gang member Jose Padilla is a trained terrorist who met with top al-Qaida leaders, discussed detonating a nuclear bomb in the United States and accepted an assignment to use natural gas to blow up high-rise apartment buildings, the Justice Department alleged Tuesday. The disclosure by Deputy Attorney General James Comey, based on interrogations with Padilla and other suspected al-Qaida operatives, came two years after the arrest of the suspected "dirty bomber." It was meant to answer criticism that the government overreached in arresting a U.S. citizen and denying him normal access to the court system.Comey said President Bush's decision to classify Padilla as an enemy combatant is supported by what was learned through the interrogation process. He described Padilla as "a soldier of our enemy, a trained, funded and equipped terrorist" who accepted "an assignment to kill hundreds of innocent men, women and children." Comey told a news conference there was no connection between release of the information and last week's criticism that his boss, Attorney General John Ashcroft, overstated the possibility of an imminent al-Qaida attack on the United States. Nor, he said, was the department attempting to influence the Supreme Court — currently considering whether the war on terrorism gives the government power to seize Americans such as Padilla without charging them. One other American citizen is being held as an enemy combatant. Steven Shapiro, legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union, called the timing of the public release "curious at best," with the Supreme Court expected to rule on the legality of the detention in the next few weeks. "At the very least, it suggests that the Justice Department is feeling pressure to explain its unprecedented decision to detain U.S. citizens as enemy combatants," Shapiro said. A seven-page summary of interrogations of Padilla and other detainees alleged he planned the attacks with the most senior lieutenants of Osama bin Laden. The al-Qaida operatives weren't certain whether Padilla would carry out the apartment attacks or try to release radiation from a "dirty bomb" after arriving back in the United States on May 8, 2002. He was arrested after landing in Chicago. Comey and a written summary by the Justice Department said Padilla and an accomplice were to locate as many as three high-rise buildings that had natural gas. They were to rent two apartments in each building, seal all the openings, turn on the gas, and set timers to detonate the buildings simultaneously at a later time. The information alleged that al-Qaida operations chief Khalid Shaikh Mohammed "wanted Padilla to hit targets in New York City, although Florida and Washington, D.C. were discussed as well. Padilla had discretion in the selection of the apartments." But Comey said other detainees gave different accounts, identifying possible locations for the attacks as Chicago, Texas and California. Comey said Padilla originally suggested to his handlers that he detonate a nuclear bomb that he thought he could make from instructions on the Internet, or that he set off a radiological bomb. However, the al-Qaida officials wanted him to focus on the apartment plot instead. One of Padilla's lawyers, Andrew Patel, characterized Comey's information as "an opening statement without a trial. We are in the same position we've been in for two years, where the government says bad things about Mr. Padilla and there's no forum for him to defend himself." The information released by Comey had been requested by Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee. Hatch said in a statement, "The information released today confirms the very real and dangerous threat posed by Jose Padilla." Padilla, by his own admission, accepted his terrorist assignment, Comey said. But the detainee "continues to maintain that he was not in the United States for that reason, and he was never really planning to go through with it," Comey added. Posted by: Fred 2004-06-01 |
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