Federal law enforcement agencies are investigating whether a radical Muslim sect here is laundering money into Pakistan, law enforcement authorities said yesterday. Authorities said that Jamaat al-Fuqra is the focus of the probe, which includes the fraudulent procurement of social services money. Al-Fuqra is linked to Muslims of the Americas, a tax-exempt group established in the United States in 1980 by Sheik Mubarik Ali Shah Gilani. The group has set up and funded rural communes that federal authorities say are linked to murder, bombings and other felonies throughout the U.S. and Canada. Sheik Gilani was arrested last week in Pakistan in connection with the kidnapping of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl. Muslims of the Americas operates communes of mostly black, American-born Muslims in Binghamton, N.Y.; Badger, Calif.; York, S.C.; and Red House, a rural village south of Appomattox, Va., law enforcement officials said.
Can't close them down for being a "religious organization," but by God we can close them down for being crooks - if we want to. Look and see where the group's defenders are in the coming weeks. |