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.if~'\>"" :..,....,.. v ,

....... "-"M£~ORANDUM FOR THE RECORD

\ \ '., Even~~'ln~~rview of FBI Special ~gent..I ..

~ype of eve~'t:.Interview

Dates: November i7,.,~003

SpeciaIAccess Issues: NOll~,

\prepar~~,bY: Michael Jacobson.. ,

T,eam Nu~~er: IA '

Li/\cation: FBIiSan Diego Field Office ,

Par,pcipants - NO,n-Commission: Assistant General Counsel Randy Blair

Pa r~kiPants - Commission: Hyon Kim, Michael Jacobson

\1 lwas involved into the investigations of al-~~~billn<1 !They

, didn't really parse out the, investigations, and looked at the two together. The two came
\ to their attention when they
were looking at the hijackers' toll recor4s:l Iwas in
• \ charge ofHazmi's residential phone in San Diego. In reviewing these records, they
\ uncovered contacts between the hijackers and a cell phone registered to 2 individuals.
'They recognized one of the subscribers' address as a military facility, The reached out to
.'t'JCIS and they looked into them, NCIS told the FBI that the two ~ad just wrapped on
training on the East Coast, and then returned to Saudi Arabia. The FBI just missed them.
i;"he NelS did a nice work up and tl~e line onl ~nd Harbi.!

\
inyestigatjo:
a lead t~ _~
S :il WS;~:gllS:l~~Qr-l
The FBI go~

__ _
~nd Har~'i'~,stoll records aslwell, This part of the

~ ~p
lun~erstandin~ is that the FBI has sent
but he doesn't know. He knows that the two
_

received training at t e avy acility in North Island. \ f

\,// Al-Harbi's address was at 'a'~ilitary facility, whllel ; ~ame back to Falls
Church, Virginia. He thinks that it was either a mosque.or' a cu tural society. His San
Diego cell phone was registered to Fali~, Church, Virgin~a.i There were quite a few calls
from'Hazmi to Harbi, and far fewer calls ...~~ ,~Th~r~ w~s speculation at the time
..that maybe Hazmi was related to Harbi. H,~doesn 't 'know.what ever came of that. They
:/ were also never able to determine whether another person wa;s using the hijackers' phone,
:."" and called these two. \'" \.:\ i /

//' I !recalls that Hazmi called Ba:\::oi!mifr!lnl ibis phons;. Some of the calls
:,/ made from Hazmi's phone were made by I lalled his uncle, the
e/i Syrian Embassy, someone in Yuma, Arizona, and s~mepafm Seattle. Bayoumi also

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': ..........""'" gave his ce"ifpfi~ne.toJ.~~ __ w_~r~__

~ijackers to use. --The--~jackers __ ~~pp?sed to take oyer a
• . '. "'" lease from Hashim al-Attas.rTheygave Bayoumi's number as the i-oc.l has no
\ \.. "idea why they would have been using Bayoumi's cell phone. The calls made regarding
\ '. al-Attas's apartment were .the only ones from Bayourni's ..phone that he can say were
\ '. made-by the hijackers. The apartment manager (George Haib);-gaidJ~at he called the
\. \'" hijackerson a certain number. This happened to be Bayoumi's cell phone:-I I
\ '. tried to pin-down an exact date for this call, but couldn't do so. He thinks that it was in
\ ......
either February or March of2000. It was within 30 days of when the hijackers arrived in
\ "'San Diego. It didn't make any sense as to why the hijackers would be moving already.
':. T~e speculation was that al-Attas was leaving and that he said to .the hijackers that they
could take over the lease, but they never actually did. He thinks that this apartment was
cheaper. Harb told the PBI that Midhar had a temper. When Harb told Midhar that he
would need to provide a deposit for the apartment, he flew off the handle. Harb said that
he had...dealt with Midhar, butdid not know Bayoumi. He said that he may have spoken
to Bayoumi once. He thinks that-he called the number and that the person who answered
handed the phone to Midhar. Harbtold Midhar that he couldn't move into the apartment
until he paid the deposit, and he neverheard from the hijackers again. To clarify, in the
application.for al-Attas's apartment, Midhar gave Bayoumi's cell phone number with the
name "Omar," He doesn't know why Midhar gave this number, considering the hijackers
had their own\rhone by this point. "

He doe~h:t recall 'Vany cOPijcts between ~~Y(lUmi and I and I

he would have re¢.ognizedl b.umber. Some of'B.~youm~;s calls were to Saudi
• Embassy lines. There were a few other "hits" in their review of Bayoumi's phone. .
Basically, everyone-had contact with Bayoumi. Bayoumi was [n contact with Thumairy,
at Thumairy's home 'phone number. Bayoumi was mainly ca]fi~g back to the Saudi
Cultural Mission in Washington, D.C. In a search of his office ..!t~h~'e~oiiI.MA"'~IWiaoIII""",
educational am hlets.' tc. The FE I ot the rsonnelli t fr
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___--T ...he xcrs put together a big folder ~h1 d Har~:::.:i.We should a·~ilI
.. __ ~
..I__
F:::.
~I an xcrs agent, abo~.~this. , ">\"
Bayoumi's calls tol..... ' hn ~e U.S. icould be written off a
business. He thinks that the timin~.6f some of these calls though was suspicious. During
the same time period the time tJlat¢e hijackers arrived ih the I).S., Bayoumi made calls
t~ I..~~.al~o ma~.e calls to Al- Thumairy. The "chance meeting"
beh~~umi and ~~~~iJ~~kers is\~ery suspici6~s. ~e co?tact between Bayo~mi
and~:l~ also S,USPICIOUS. "There "~sno other remarkable contact that he can think of,
shedding light o'~':B,~'youmi's activitles.] Idid\.pote~that most of the calls from
Bayoumi's phone can-be attributed to his-wife. He let-..others look into the Bayoumi-
Aulaqi relationship sincethey were already familiar with it\· ..H¢ can't recall contact
and others.but he did note thatBayoumi :~a$ in touch with other

•
betweenBayoumi
imamsbecause of his position in the-mosque, At theendof'Bayoumi's stay in San

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• D~~go~·therewere many calls to L!'na6n.· :las:the

number inYemen

CJ~~:~~I~~;t~
/Ial;went
associated ~it~,ai~Qa'ida/this:w~s

throu~l
call from the hijackers to the
run down by New York.

sioc, and San Diego did not deal with

.....__ ..Idoesriot recall other c!~ifsmade br the hijackers .

.......... __ ..I~as on the Evidenc~/~~sponse T~am. \He was involved in
the search of
Modhar Abdullah's residence. He ~~~' also part of the i~terview team of Os am a
Owadallah. There was information.linking Owadallah tQI I They couldn't tell the
court about it. Duri . .tia . '.'.' . e thought that Owadallah was open and
candid. In the.initial [nterview he just said that
. a provi e rm WIt ~,'e ter. The~nit turned out that Owadallah had been
some of the finances
"'h'!"'"an~dl!"!"'in"'g ~~rI: I.a~d also reviewed the VBL video. During the
polygraph session he admitted Ai lot more. "fI~ wasinconsistent with how many times he
met Mihdharand Hazmi. In ~I)e .first interview, he! said he met them only once. He said
that he didn't remember Midharbut recognized Hazrni. He.
said that he may have seen
him either at work or at the ,~qSque. In another he said tha1 it was more like 40 ..50
times, and that he helped t~'¢niset up a comp~t~r.l: ~hin~s that the latter answer
was more credible. He al~9 finds it unlikely t~at he only knew Hazmi and not Midhar.

•
They were practicallyjoined'at the hip. The o~ly separation was that Hazmi played with
a soccer team in San Di'¢'~o!and Midhar did not; \ ! f

I Q //l~ted, was onreryon~js mind, because they had seen him

surveilling the FB} office in S.~n Diego. ~s not sure whether or not they've been
able to connec ........directly. to the hijackers. "~e didn't know that I ~tayed at a
~ __ ......__ ....,~,/_,/_~~"Ow~daJ]ah also worked with all of the associates at the
exaco. c;foesn·t,t,kn~.~a-lot of the details.of the investigation. He basically
only knows what q~ heard In, the.interviews, since that was his role ip the investigation.

.I ~oted that ~~~~e~t~ry training \~ receivdd at Quantico on CT did

not prepare him to work CT cases.' ...\>.. \, \ \.
I,
!!

'<:::\~:.\. \\

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