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Beatrice1000
Resource Specialist
Joined: 10 Aug 2004
Posts: 1179
Location: Minneapolis, MN
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 Posted: Sun Apr 10, 2005 8:29 pm Post subject: FBI Says Teens Planned Suicide Bombing -NY |
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This story has struck a nerve – another one of those “outrage” stories whenever the FBI investigates possible terror suspects and/or illegal immigrants. I know the FBI has many failings, but I also believe they are doing the best they can and that we don’t even hear about a lot of their successes. I opt to give them the benefit of the doubt. It will be interesting to see what the evidence is and to hear the final report on this investigation:
(emphasis added)
| Quote: | “Report: FBI Says Teens Planned Suicide Bombing,” WCBS-TV, NY – 4/7/05
Teenage Girls Are From Bangladesh And Guinea
NEW YORK (AP) Two 16-year-old girls from New York City have been arrested on immigration charges after federal authorities said they planned to become suicide bombers, according to a published report.
......
Adam Carroll, a community activist with the Islamic Circle of North America, told the Times one of the girls had been arrested after she stopped attending public high school in September. Federal immigration agents investigated her home and discovered an essay about suicide and Islam on her computer, Carroll said. The case seemed to be “an investigation that’s gotten out of hand, like a lot of other so-called terror investigations,” Carroll told the newspaper. |
| Quote: | “Teachers and Classmates Express Outrage at Arrest of Girl, 16, as a Terrorist Threat,” by Nina Bernstein, NYTimes – 4/9/05
At Heritage High School in East Harlem, where the student idiom is hip-hop and salsa, the 16-year-old Guinean girl stood out, but not just because she wore Islamic dress. She was so well liked that when she ran for student body president, she came in second to one of her best friends - the Christian daughter of the president of the parent-teacher association, Deleen P. Carr. Now Ms. Carr, a speech pathologist who calls herself "a typical American citizen," is as outraged as the girl's teachers and classmates, who have learned that the girl and another 16-year-old are being called would-be suicide bombers and are being held in an immigration detention center in Pennsylvania.
"They have painted this picture of her as this person that is trying to destroy our way of life, and I know in my heart of hearts that this is bogus," said Ms. Carr, who welcomed the Guinean girl to her house daily and knows her family well. "I feel like, how dare they? She's a minor, and even if she's not a citizen, she has rights as a human being." |
This girl might be innocent – she might be 100% innocent -- but also, I do not want to trust our nation’s security on what Ms. Carr knows in her “heart of hearts” because she sees the girl daily. As an illegal, is there a violation of her “human being rights” by her being held according to our laws in an immigration detention center?
| Quote: | According to a government document provided to The NY Times by a federal official earlier this week, the FBI has asserted that both girls are "an imminent threat to the security of the U.S. based on evidence that they plan to be suicide bombers." No evidence was cited, and federal officials will not comment on the case.
Its mysteries deepened as teachers and neighbors gave details of the Guinean girl's life, like the jeans she wore under her Muslim garb, her lively classroom curiosity about topics like Judaism and art and her after-school care for four younger siblings while her parents, illegal immigrants who have lived in the United States since 1990, eked out a living. |
The FBI may be right or wrong on this – sometimes they make mistakes – but part of the “why” of the investigation is apparent: “..her parents, illegal immigrants...” This article passes quickly over “illegal” and makes sure you know that in spite of that little problem, they “eked out a living” here….
| Quote: | | "I just can't fathom this," said her art teacher, Kimberly Lane, who has repeatedly called the youth detention center but like Ms. Carr was not allowed to speak to the girl, who has no lawyer. Among the unanswered questions they raised was why, if she was really a suspect, no F.B.I. agent had shown up to search her school locker or question her classmates, who sent her letters of support. "This is a girl who's been in this country since she was 2 years old," Ms. Lane said. "She's just a regular teenager - like, two weeks ago her biggest worry was whether she'd done her homework or studied for a science test." |
I wouldn’t be so sure that the FBI didn’t search her school locker…. surely they wouldn’t have called Ms. Lane about it. “…just a regular teenager” – with all the school shootings here and suicide bombings carried out by children/teens in other parts of the world, we all know that kids are capable of murder – acting and/or looking like a “regular teenager” isn’t evidence of innocence. (How does Lane really know what the girls “biggest worry” was?)
| Quote: | Until now, attention has focused on the other 16-year-old, a Bangladeshi girl reared in Queens who could not deal with the hurly-burly of her West Side high school and withdrew into home schooling. Yesterday, on a motion of the government, an immigration judge closed the Bangladeshi girl's bond hearing to the public and adjourned it to next Thursday, said Troy Mattes, a lawyer who is taking over the case but has yet to meet her.
By the Bangladeshi girl's account, reported by her mother, the girls did not meet until March 24, after their separate arrests in early-morning raids on immigration charges against their parents. Both grew up in Islamic families. But while the Bangladeshi girl had grown increasingly pious, and uncomfortable in the urban culture of the High School of Environmental Studies on West 56th Street, the Guinean girl, a 10th grader, embraced every aspect of Heritage High, at 106th Street and Lexington Avenue, her teachers said.
"She is, yes, an orthodox Muslim, but completely integrated into this school," said Jessica Siegel, her English teacher in a class in which topics like teenage pregnancy and world politics were discussed. Ms. Siegel was profiled in the book "Small Victories," by Samuel G. Freedman, as an unsentimental, but fiercely committed teacher who provoked and delighted her students. "She's a wonderful, wonderful girl," Ms. Siegel said. "She's about the last person anyone could imagine being a suicide bomber." |
What does a potential suicide bomber look and act like?
| Quote: | The English teacher's most vivid recollection was of a day two months ago when she heard a kind of roar in the hallway of the school, which is full of colorful student collages and life-size sculptures in papier-mâché. The teenager had stopped wearing her veil, and she beamed as her fellow students, seeing her face for the first time, cheered.
After the class read "Night," the Holocaust memoir by Elie Wiesel, the girl wrote a paper about genocide in the Sudan, she recalled. But she was so excited about a field trip to see Christo's "Gates" in Central Park, Ms. Siegel said, that she skipped an appointment at immigration - a teenage impulse the teacher now worries might have set off problems with federal authorities. Her father is now in immigration jail facing deportation. |
She had a “teenage impulse” and skipped the appointment at immigration – she wasn’t avoiding the appointment, she didn’t have any independent thinking concerning it -- she merely had an impulse. Just a teenage impulse.
| Quote: | | At Woodrow Wilson Houses a few blocks from the school, a sticker on the family's apartment door reads, "Allah is our protector." Yesterday no one was home, but across the hall, Christine Anderson, a neighbor, shook her head in disbelief when she learned why she had not seen the girl or her father in recent weeks. "Why would they take the lady's daughter?" she asked. "They're nice people, and hard-working people. I've been here four years. I know she's not a problem child." |
Again, another person knows “she’s not a problem child.” It boggles my mind that people would be so sure of their impressions and not even consider that it could be possible for a teenager to secretly plan a violent act – shocked neighbors, family & teachers in the aftermath then saying: “but he was such a nice, quiet boy.” “I just didn’t see the signs….”
| Quote: | | Ms. Lane, the art teacher, said that when Heritage High first learned that immigration agents had picked up the girl, one of her best friends asked if someone from the school might have denounced her as an illegal immigrant. "I remember telling her the government doesn't go after 16-year-old girls," Ms. Lane said. "And in the last few days, I'm wrestling with the fact that, yes, it does." |
The government doesn’t “go after 16-yr old girls,” but thankfully, it does from time to time go after illegal immigrants. Ms. Lane wrestles with that reality. But I don’t hear her or any of the other people in this article wrestling with the reality that yes, the FBI might be wrong – but also, there is a possibility that the FBI might be right. They have not divulged any of their evidence yet.
One or both of these girls might be totally innocent .. there might be some awful misunderstanding regarding the evidence -- but that will all come out in the end. The FBI has found something or they would not have acted. Should investigations not take place because a mistake might be made?? Should we have any respect at all for the FBI, for our laws -- or should they be immediately denounced whenever they investigate illegals and/or potentially dangerous teens? (Repeal these outrageous laws then, disband the FBI, let’s all just hold hands in la-la land.)
Where to err... What level of risk is acceptable?
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LewWaters
Admin
Joined: 18 May 2004
Posts: 4042
Location: Washington State
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| Posted: Sun Apr 10, 2005 8:51 pm Post subject: |
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What part of ILLEGAL immigrant do they not understand?
| Quote: | | even if she's not a citizen, she has rights as a human being." |
Makes me wonder where this teacher was a couple weeks ago about another woman, who wasn't a minor, who was a LEGAL citizen and who I thought also had HUMAN RIGHTS by the name of Terri Schiavo. I don't know this teachers stance, but I sure didn't hear any outrage from her or the others objecting to the FBI's handling of this.
On the other hand, if the FBI ignores whatever evidence they have and the girls do succeed in setting off a suicide bombing, would the teacher and othert students cry that the girls had HUMAN RIGHTS then?
As I've always thought, had Bush grounded all aircraft on Sept.10, 2001 because he had gotten wind of the coming attacks, these same people would have gone ballistic over how unfair and overbearing that was.
Even with 20/20 hindsight, some people just can't see the forest for the trees.
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Rdtf
CNO
Joined: 13 May 2004
Posts: 2209
Location: BUSHville
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| Posted: Sun Apr 10, 2005 10:48 pm Post subject: |
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| This is very irritating. I'm with ya, Beatrice, I lean towards giving the FBI benefit of the doubt. Most of the time they are correct. And the checks and balances they have to go thru just to do an investigation, let alone make an arrest keeps them from barking up too many wrong trees. And yes, there is much that we never hear about and that is probably for the best. But customs and immigration have been way too lenient and underfunded and now this is out of control. Many come here illegally, commit (sometimes horrible) crimes and get the benefit of our legal system. Sure they are human beings and deserve to be treated like one. But back in their own country. I do sympathize with the people that search for a better life and come here. That is what this country was built on. After all, we still allow immigration...but follow the rules and do it the right way, or you're out. |
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Tom Poole
Vice Admiral
Joined: 07 Aug 2004
Posts: 914
Location: America
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| Posted: Sun Apr 10, 2005 10:50 pm Post subject: |
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Hopefully, we'll have 11 million tender humane stories like this one. We need to find all of them and without so much as a scratch or hair out of place, deport them. I feel great compassion for these desperate people but we cannot afford to tear down our immigration laws. Years ago, when Sonny Bono was alive and a US Representative, he was asked what he thought about the illegal alien problem. He replied, "It's illegal." IMO, that's the bottom line.
And yes, I agree we need to stop interfering with law enforcement. If we have concrete evidence of wrongdoing, we should blow the whistle but if not, we need to let them do their jobs.
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Beatrice1000
Resource Specialist
Joined: 10 Aug 2004
Posts: 1179
Location: Minneapolis, MN
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| Posted: Sat May 07, 2005 2:35 pm Post subject: |
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UPDATE:
“Closed hearings, sealed government documents and gag orders for lawyers...”
The matter has been resolved. One family here illegally has gone home:
| Quote: | “FBI releases NYC teens detained for 6 weeks,” AP – 5/7/05
NEW YORK -- The FBI has released a 16-year-old girl and will allow another to leave the country after the teens were detained for six weeks amid concerns they were potential recruits for a suicide bomb plot that never materialized. <…> Adama Bah, 16, a Guinean immigrant, returned to her high school on Friday to friends and teachers who insisted she was innocent.
The other girl, who was not identified because she is a minor and was not charged with any crime, was granted a request allowing her to return to Bangladesh with her family. <…> Troy Mattes, the Bangladeshi girl's lawyer, said his client came to the United States at age 4. Her family's applications for political asylum were closed in the late 1990s, although there were no deportation orders against them, Mattes said. When the general consul of Bangladesh asked why the girl was being detained, the homeland security officials wrote that the girl was being held only because she was in the country illegally. Her parents asked the government to let the family leave the country. |
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