Bin Laden Son-In-Law Appears in New York on Terror Charge

Bloomberg

Sulaiman Abu Ghayth, a son-in-law of Osama bin Laden who served as his spokesman, pleaded not guilty in federal court to charges that he conspired to kill Americans before and after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

Abu Ghayth, hands cuffed behind his back and wearing dark- blue prison garb, entered the plea today before U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan in Manhattan. About a dozen security guards were in the ceremonial courtroom. Kaplan scheduled the next hearing for April 8. He didn’t set a trial date.

The most senior al-Qaeda member to face a civilian U.S. judge on charges stemming from the attacks, Abu Ghayth was captured by American agents after a decade-long manhunt as he sought to travel from Jordan to Kuwait. He was indicted for allegedly plotting with bin Laden and other members of al-Qaeda from 1989 until now to kill U.S. nationals.

“It has been 13 years since Abu Ghayth allegedly worked alongside Osama bin Laden in his campaign of terror and 13 years since he allegedly took to the public airwaves, exhorting others to embrace al-Qaeda’s cause and warning of more terrorist attacks like the mass murder of 9/11,” Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said yesterday in a statement.
Life Sentence

Abu Ghayth, 47, was captured by members of the Central Intelligence Agency and Federal Bureau of Investigation and faces life in prison if convicted, the government said. The U.S. said he gave extensive post-arrest statements. His statement is 22 pages long, according John P. Cronan, a prosecutor. The statement is being translated, Cronan said.

Philip Weinstein, one of three federal defenders appointed by Kaplan to represent Abu Ghayth, said he has met with his client previously. Abu Ghayth said through an interpreter that he wants to be known as “Mr. Sulaiman.”

Abu Ghayth is being held in the high-security wing of the Metropolitan Correctional Center in Manhattan, according to a person familiar with the matter who asked not to be named because the information isn’t public. The same facility once held blind sheik Omar Abdel Rahman, who was convicted in 1995 of plotting to blow up an FBI building and other targets in New York.

Abu Ghayth is viewed as having been among al-Qaeda’s most influential surviving leaders since U.S. Navy SEALs killed bin Laden in May 2011. He’s also the highest-ranking member of al- Qaeda brought to stand trial in a federal court in the U.S., according to the FBI.
Allegiance Oath

Prosecutors allege that Abu Ghayth served alongside bin Laden, appearing with him and bin Laden’s then-deputy, Ayman al- Zawahiri, speaking on behalf of the terrorist organization and in support of its mission. Abu Ghayth swore an oath of allegiance to bin Laden, called a “bayat,” agreeing to support violent attacks against U.S. property and citizens, either military or civilian, prosecutors said.

As a spokesman for al-Qaeda, Abu Ghayth warned that attacks similar to those of Sept. 11 would continue, the U.S. said. On Sept. 12, 2001, Abu Ghayth, with bin Laden and Al-Zawahiri, spoke on behalf of al-Qaeda, warning the U.S.: “A great army is gathering against you.” He also called upon “the nation of Islam” to do battle “against the Jews, the Christians and the Americans,” prosecutors alleged.
‘Airplanes Storm’

He later gave a speech directed at the U.S. secretary of state, warning that “the storms shall not stop, especially the airplanes storm,” the U.S. alleged in the indictment. He advised Muslims, children and opponents of the U.S. “not to board any aircraft and not to live in high rises.”

George Venizelos, the assistant director-in-charge of the FBI’s New York field office, said Abu Ghayth held a “key position in al-Qaeda, comparable to the consigliere in a mob family or propaganda minister in a totalitarian regime.”

“He used his position to persuade others to swear loyalty to al-Qaeda’s murderous cause,” Venizelos said in a statement. “He used his position to threaten the United States and incite its enemies.”

Abu Ghayth managed to smuggle himself from Afghanistan into Iran in 2002, prosecutors said.

This year, Turkish authorities, acting on information from the CIA, first seized Abu Ghayth at a hotel in Ankara, according to U.S. congressional and intelligence officials. A Turkish court rejected a U.S. request for his extradition and released him on the grounds that he hadn’t been charged with committing any crime in Turkey.
Iranian Passport

CIA officers located him after he arrived in Ankara with an Iranian passport and he asked Saudi Arabian diplomats to help his wife and children go to their country, according to the U.S. officials, who asked not to be named because intelligence matters are involved. His wife is a Saudi citizen.

Abu Ghayth was seized when he attempted to travel to Kuwait from Jordan, a country with which the U.S. maintains close ties, the U.S. officials said.

Kuwait had revoked Abu Ghayth’s citizenship in 2001, according to the U.S. Treasury Department. Kuwait took the action after he was seen in video footage defending the Sept. 11 attacks and threatening reprisals for the subsequent American invasion of Afghanistan.

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder called the apprehension of Abu Ghayth an “important milestone” in counterterrorism efforts.
‘America’s Enemies’

“No amount of distance or time will weaken our resolve to bring America’s enemies to justice,” Holder said.

Some Republican lawmakers, including Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and Mike Rogers of Michigan, chairman of the House intelligence committee, criticized the Obama administration’s handling of the Abu Ghayth case, saying he should be tried as an enemy combatant in military tribunal, not as a criminal defendant in a civilian court.

The decision to charge Abu Ghayth in a federal court in New York rather than before a military tribunal may reflect that prosecutors think they have sufficient evidence to imprison him for life without needing to rely on classified intelligence, said Michael M. Rosensaft, a former federal prosecutor who’s now a partner at Katten Muchin Rosenmann LLP, a New York law firm.

Rosensaft, who worked in the terrorism and international narcotics unit of the U.S. Attorney’s office in Manhattan, said in a phone interview that the decision on where and how to try bin Laden’s son-in-law rests on trade-offs among security, secrecy and rules of evidence, which are tighter under the rules for military tribunals.

The case is U.S. v. Abu Ghayth, 13-cr-01023, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York (Manhattan).

To contact the reporters on this story: Patricia Hurtado in Manhattan federal court at [email protected]; Bob Van Voris in Manhattan federal court at [email protected]