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| Immigration judge rejects Saudi’s offer to return home |
| 2004-06-19 |
| An immigration judge on Friday rejected a Saudi man’s offer to voluntarily return home, three weeks after federal officials suggested he had ties to the Sept. 11 hijackers. Hasan Saddiq Faseh Alddin, 34, wrote Immigration Judge Anthony Attenaid that he was prepared to abandon his fight to remain in the United States. His attorney, Randy Hamud, and his supporters said Alddin was discouraged by the prospect of remaining jailed while his case winds its way through court. ``Not all persons are cut out for long-term incarceration,’’ Hamud told reporters. Attenaid closed the bond hearing to reporters and other spectators after rejecting Alddin’s offer. After the hearing, Hamud said the judge granted a defense request to continue the case to July 8. He indicated that Alddin wasn’t ready to give up. ``There’s still a lot of fight left in the dog,’’ Hamud said. Federal agents arrested Alddin on May 27 near his home in Vista, a north San Diego suburb, on immigration charges resulting from two convictions for domestic violence. Alddin has since been in federal custody, awaiting the outcome of deportation proceedings. The Department of Homeland Security said last month that Alddin was a roommate of a close friend of Saudi hijackers Nawaf Alhazmi and Khalid al-Midhar in the 1990s. The two hijackers died aboard the American Airlines jet that crashed into the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001. Homeland Security said in a press release at the time that Alddin was ``believed to have ties’’ to two of the Sept. 11 hijackers. The press release said the government was ``committed to taking action on intelligence to prevent another terrorist attack on American soil.’’ Several Alddin supporters, speaking to reporters outside the courthouse, criticized the government for attempting to link Alddin to terrorists. ``This is nothing more than a witch hunt,’’ said Khalid A. Jaludi, who knows Alddin from a Vista mosque. ``Just because you’re Muslim, you’re guilty.’’ Jesse Bernal, who also knows Alddin through the mosque, said it was natural for Alddin to choose someone from his own country as a roommate. ``We’re not guilty by association,’’ he said. According to Homeland Security, Alddin entered the United States on a student visa in 1994 and became a legal permanent resident in 1999. |
| Posted by:TS(vice girl) |
| #6 LOL AP! |
| Posted by: Shipman 2004-06-19 7:46:53 PM |
| #5 You beat me to it, AP. "Not all persons are cut out for long-term incarceration" I was going to say that this seems to be a fair description of many criminals, regardless of how appropriate their custody may be. |
| Posted by: Zenster 2004-06-19 4:33:16 PM |
| #4 May I present to Rantburgers the Quote of the Week: ``Not all persons are cut out for long-term incarceration,’’ |
| Posted by: Alaska Paul 2004-06-19 1:03:01 PM |
| #3 Randall B Hamud - lawyer to all of the San Diego area arrestees - scumbag extraordinaire |
| Posted by: Frank G 2004-06-19 11:04:18 AM |
| #2 ``Just because you’re Muslim, you’re guilty.’ Careful there fella. We've been trying this "religion of peace" thing for a while and its beginning to wear thin. And more and more of us ain't buying it, and those that still do, aer feeling a bit sheepish about it, because folks keep killing Americans in the name of Allah. You keep talking like that, and this might be taken as a statement of fact, rather than a complaint. |
| Posted by: Ben 2004-06-19 4:13:39 AM |
| #1 ..So he's been in custody for 24 days. Whatta shame. The people his roomies killed have been dead for almost three years. He'll live. Mike |
| Posted by: Mike Kozlowski 2004-06-19 1:29:47 AM |