Egyptian: Held Tried to use phony ID at city club
Wednesday, March 13
Egyptian arrested here, had terrorist documents
By Thomas L. Flannery
Intelligencer Journal Staff
An Egyptian national who, authorities said, had documents in his possession linking him to terrorist networks was arrested at a Lancaster city nightclub for passing a phony New Jersey identification card.
Investigation by city police led to the discovery that Ahmed Ebrahim Moussa, 25, of 25 Jones St., Jersey City, N.J., also was an illegal alien who had been living in Lancaster for the past seven months.
Mark E. Reimann, a special agent with the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service, said Tuesday Moussa's visa had expired and that the extension he had requested was denied.
"He's what we call an overstay," Reimann said, declining further comment.
City police said that when Moussa was arrested March 7, he was carrying among other documents a phony New Jersey state identification card he told police he made at an unknown shop on 42nd Street in New York City.
"Upon arrest, (Moussa) was carrying documents known to be affiliated with active terrorism networks," according to court documents used to revoke Moussa's initial $5,000 bail, set on a charge of carrying an altered, forged or counterfeit document.
Assistant District Attorney Susan Moyer, in her petition to Lancaster County Court to have Moussa's bail increased to $1 million cash, wrote, "Based on information received by the commonwealth from federal law enforcement sources, the commonwealth believes (Moussa) is a flight risk, is dangerous and will fail to appear as required."
At noon March 7, Judge Michael Perezous did one better.
Perezous revoked Moussa's bail, pending a formal bail hearing, which was to be held Tuesday before Judge David Ashworth. The hearing was postponed until 11 a.m. Thursday, however, because an interpreter for Moussa, who speaks Arabic, could not be located.
District Attorney Donald Totaro said his office was contacted by the INS and that Assistant U.S. Attorney Tina Gabbrielli, chief of Violent Crimes and Anti-terrorism Coordinator for the Eastern District, which serves Lancaster County, has been involved since Moussa's arrest.
Gabbrielli was traveling Tuesday and could not be reached for comment.
It isn't known if Moussa's alleged affiliation is with the al-Qaida terrorist network started by Osama bin Laden in the late 1980s and believed responsible for the Sept. 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon.
State department officials, in the publication "Patterns of Global Terrorism, 2000" issued in April 2001, identified al-Qaida as a "focal point or umbrella organization for a worldwide network that includes many Sunni Islamic extremist groups such as Egyptian Islamic Jihad, some members of al-Gama'at al-Islamiyya, the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, and the Harakat ul-Mujahidin."
Moussa's attorney, Samuel Encarnacion of the Public Defender's Office, said he hadn't seen any document linking his client to a terrorist group.
"To date, I have seen no proof whatsoever to tie him (Moussa) to any terrorist group," Encarnacion said, adding that Moussa's brother is a longtime U.S. citizen who lives at the Jersey City address Moussa gave city police at the time of his arrest at the nightclub.
Encarnacion said Moussa was visiting someone in Lancaster, but Encarnacion did not say whom his client was here to see.
Court records show Moussa, when he was arraigned on the phony state ID charges, told District Justice Mary Mongiovi Sponaugle he had been staying with an Egyptian friend in Lancaster for the past seven months. Moussa said he didn't know the person's address.
Moussa was arrested by city police Officer Donald Erb at 12:09 a.m. March 7 at The Village, 205 N. Christian St. An employee of the popular night spot determined the New Jersey state identification card Moussa showed him wasn't real.
Police determined that not only was the identification card bogus, the Social Security number on the card also was not Moussa's.
City police Captain of Detectives John Flemming Jr. said the city remains on a high state of alert to possible terrorist threats.
"After Sept. 11, we are much more diligent in checking people using fraudulent identification," Flemming said. "Officer Erb was not comfortable with the identification and decided to take the individual into custody."
Moussa is being held without bail in Lancaster County Prison and on a federal detainer for overstaying his visa.
Staff writer Brett Lovelace contributed to this report
lancnews.com
P.S. Good find on that story!! I posted the story & link so people wouldn't think you made it up. |
