|
AMP Report – March 31, 2008
Muslim leaders visit Al-Arian in Virginia prison
On March 31, 2008, Representatives of several American Muslim civil right groups visited Dr. Sami Al-Arian, a former Florida professor currently on his second hunger strike in federal detention to protest unjust treatment by the U.S. authorities. Meanwhile, Civil rights advocates urged the Justice Department to honor Al-Arian’s plea agreement.
Dr. Al-Arian began refusing food and water on March 3rd to protest a third attempt by prosecutors to compel his testimony in court. He was transferred to a medical facility in North Carolina, but has since been returned to Northern Neck Regional Jail in Warsaw, Va. He is now taking only liquids and has lost 32 pounds.
Those taking part in today's visit included representatives of American Muslim Alliance (AMA), Muslim American Society (MAS), Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), and American Muslim Taskforce on Civil Rights and Elections (AMT), a national coalition of major American Muslim organizations.
Dr. Sami Al-Arian has lost 32 pounds in a month-long hunger strike, Nihad Awad, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) said after the visit.
"I was really shocked to see how skinny he is and how much weight he lost," said Nihad Awad. "His hunger strike began on March 3, and now he looks like a totally different person from the person I knew five years ago."
Still, Awad said, Al-Arian's spirits are high. "Amazingly, he is composed and he made sense. He was very sharp, very alert. "He believes in his just cause and we were there to support him," Awad said.
"The last thing you want to see," Awad said, "is a political prisoner dying on hunger strike."
Following the meeting, delegation members called on the House Judiciary Committee to use its oversight function to intervene in Al-Arian's case. They also urged American Muslims and other people of conscience to contact the committee.
CAIR recently asked that letters urging Al-Arian's release be sent to Judge Gerald Lee of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, to Attorney General Michael Mukasey and to congressional leaders. Supporters are also being asked to write letters directly to Al-Arian.
Al-Arian began his first hunger strike last year after being given a sentence of up to 18 months for refusing to testify before a grand jury in Virginia. His attorneys say an earlier plea agreement freed him from further cooperation with the government. Supporters also say the government's actions amount to a form of harassment.
In December of last year, CAIR welcomed a judge's decision to lift civil contempt charges against Al-Arian. The charges were dropped when the grand jury he was subpoenaed to testify before expired.
In 2005, a Florida jury rejected federal charges that Al-Arian operated a cell for the Palestinian Islamic Jihad. Al-Arian later pleaded guilty to a lesser charge and was scheduled for release and deportation in April.
At the time of his first hunger strike, AMT said the prison sentence given to Al-Arian amounted to unconstitutional "double jeopardy."
A recent documentary film, "USA vs. Al-Arian," offers a family portrait that documents the Al-Arian family's desperate attempt to fight terrorism charges leveled by the U.S. government.
Civil rights advocates urge Justice Department
to honor Al-Arian plea agreement
On March 26, 2008, civil rights advocates and community-based organizations met with Department of Justice officials to urge the federal prosecutors to honor their plea agreement with Dr. Sami Al-Arian acquitted on terrorism-related charges in 2005. Dr. Sami Al-Arian agreed to a 2006 plea agreement with federal prosecutors on the condition that he not be required to testify against others and that he be released for deportation after the end of his current sentence.
Leaders from the Muslim Public Affairs Council, the American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, Muslim Advocates and AltMuslim presented a joint letter to Department of Justice (DOJ) officials during the meeting which states, in part:
“After serving five years of detention in a federal penitentiary, much of it in solitary confinement, and being acquitted of all major charges, no public interest is served by continuing to detain Dr. Al-Arian. Indeed, the public interest is best served when our government follows through on its commitments, preserves its integrity, and upholds the legitimacy of our criminal justice system.
”We thus call on the U.S. Department of Justice to honor the terms of the plea agreement and immediately release Dr. Al-Arian for deportation on April 7, 2008 -- the day he is currently scheduled to have served his sentence.”
Despite the plea agreement, the Justice Department subpoenaed Dr. Al-Arian to testify before another grand jury in 2008. Advocates are demanding that the Justice Department uphold their promise and not to seek to compel Dr. Al-Arian to testify against others.
"The public interest is best served when our government follows through on its commitments, preserves its integrity, and upholds the legitimacy of our criminal justice system," said Executive Director Salam Al-Marayati.
Dr. Al-Arian, a former Florida university professor, was arrested in 2003 on charges of funding terrorism. In December of 2005, a jury acquitted Dr. Al-Arian of 8 of the 17 charges brought against him and was hung on the remaining charges. In April of 2006, Dr. Al-Arian pleaded guilty to a single non-terrorism related count of conspiracy and agreed to be deported.
Despite the U.S. government's representation that Dr. Al-Arian would not be compelled to testify against others, Dr. Al-Arian was subpoenaed and jailed for refusing to testify against others. Even after a civil contempt charge was lifted in 2007, the Justice Department again subpoenaed Dr. Al-Arian to testify before another grand jury in 2008. Dr. Al-Arian has rejected this latest demand to testify and is protesting the contravention by means of a hunger strike. As a result of the strike, Dr. Al-Arian was recently transferred from his Virginia prison to a medical facility in North Carolina. He has lost nearly 30 pounds and is extremely ill due to severe dehydration.
|
