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Monday, January 9, 2012

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Sami Osmakac Arrested by the FBI in an Alleged Terrorist Attack

McNabb Associates, P.C. (Federal Criminal Defense Lawyers)
Submitted at 10:46 AM January 9, 2012

Sami Osmakac Tampa Bay Online on January 9, 2012 released the following: Feds: Man planned terrorism attacks in Tampa By ELAINE SILVESTRINI | The Tampa Tribune TAMPA Federal agents over the weekend arrested a Pinellas Park man described as having extremist jihadist beliefs who wanted to blow up a target in Tampa and create terror in victims hearts. I want to do something terrifying, he said, according to a federal complaint, like one day, one night, somethings going to happen. Then six hours later, something else. Sami Osmakac, 25, was taken into custody after an FBI sting operation in which he tried to buy explosives, at least 10 grenades, Uzis and an AK-47, authorities said. Osmakacs intended target shifted over the course of the investigation, which spanned several months, at times involving government buildings, the Hillsborough County Sheriffs Office operations center in Ybor City and, ultimately, a pub in South Tampa, apparently MacDintons, authorities said. The arrest came about, in part, because of assistance from the Muslim community, said U.S. Attorney Robert ONeill, who

expressed his thanks in a news release. The sting culminated at a Tampa hotel Saturday night after Osmakac had the person from whom he was purchasing the explosives unknown to him, an undercover agent film him making a video explaining his reasoning for the planned attack, according to the complaint. In the eight-minute video, Osmakac is seen cross-legged on the floor with a pistol in his hand and an AK-47 behind him. In it, according to the complaint, he states that Muslim blood is more valuable than that of people who do not believe in Islam. He says he wants payback for wrong that was done to Muslims. Osmakac, who was born in the former Yugoslavia, came to authorities attention in September when he contacted a store owner and asked for flags representing alQaida, according to a federal complaint. Osmakac began working for the owner as a laborer. The store owner contacted the FBI, which initiated an undercover investigation. Although the informant initially refused to allow agents to record conversations, he or she ultimately participated in recorded meetings with Osmakac, the complaint states. In one recorded meeting in November, Osmakac drove around Tampa with the informant and talked about carrying out a violent attack, according to the complaint. The informant told Osmakac he or she could introduce him to someone to

provide Osmakac with firearms and explosives. The informant then introduced Osmakac to the undercover agent, according to a federal complaint. In addition to a car loaded with explosives, Osmakac expressed an interest in a belt loaded with explosives, which he could set off if someone tried to arrest him, authorities said. Douglas McNabb McNabb Associates, P.C.s Federal Criminal Defense Attorneys Videos: Federal Crimes Be Careful Federal Crimes Be Proactive Federal Crimes Federal Indictment Federal Crimes Detention Hearing To find additional federal criminal news, please read Federal Crimes Watch Daily. Douglas McNabb and other members of the U.S. law firm practice and write and/ or report extensively on matters involving Federal Criminal Defense, INTERPOL Red Notice Removal, International Extradition and OFAC SDN Sanctions Removal. The author of this blog is Douglas McNabb. Please feel free to contact him directly at mcnabb@mcnabbassociates.com or at one of the offices listed above.

Triad Mining Agrees to Resolve Clean Water Act Violations and Restore Affected Waterways in Indiana
(USDOJ: Justice News)
Submitted at 1:35 PM January 9, 2012

Broward County, Fla.-Area Halfway House Owner Pleads Guilty to Fraud and Kickback Scheme
(USDOJ: Justice News)
Submitted at 3:27 PM January 9, 2012

Triad Mining Inc., the owner and operator of 31 surface mines in Appalachia and Indiana, has agreed to pay a penalty and to restore affected waterways for failing to obtain the required Clean Water Act (CWA) permit for stream impacts caused by its surface mining operation in Indiana.

Barry Nash, 69, pleaded guilty before U.S. Magistrate Judge Barry L. Garber in Miami to one count of conspiracy to commit health care fraud.

U.S. Agents Aided Mexican Drug Trafficker to Infiltrate His Criminal Ring
McNabb Associates, P.C. (Federal Criminal Defense Lawyers)
Submitted at 9:32 AM January 9, 2012

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(Photo: Reuters) Harold Mauricio PovedaOrtega, an accused Colombian drug trafficker, in custody in 2010. The New York Times on January 9, 2012 released the following: By GINGER THOMPSON WASHINGTON American drug enforcement agents posing as money launderers secretly helped a powerful Mexican drug trafficker and his principal Colombian cocaine supplier move millions in drug proceeds around the world, as part of an effort to infiltrate and dismantle the criminal organizations wreaking havoc south of the border, according to newly obtained Mexican government documents. The documents, part of an extradition order by the Mexican Foreign Ministry against the Colombian supplier, describe American counternarcotics agents, Mexican law enforcement officials and a Colombian informant working undercover together over several months in 2007. Together, they conducted numerous wire transfers of tens of thousands of dollars at a time, smuggled millions of dollars in bulk cash and escorted at least one large shipment of cocaine from Ecuador to Dallas to Madrid. The extradition order obtained by the Mexican magazine emeequis and shared with The New York Times includes testimony by a Drug Enforcement Administration special agent who oversaw a covert money laundering investigation against a Colombian trafficker named Harold Mauricio Poveda-Ortega, also known as The Rabbit. He is accused of having sent some 150 tons of cocaine to Mexico between 2000 and 2010. Much of that cocaine, the authorities said, was destined for the United States. Last month, The Times reported that these kinds of operations had begun in Mexico as part of the drug agencys expanding role in that countrys fight against organized crime. The newly obtained documents provide rare details of the extent of that cooperation and the ways that it blurs the lines between fighting and facilitating crime. Morris Panner, a former assistant United States attorney who is an adviser at the Center for International Criminal Justice at Harvard, said there were inherent risks in international law enforcement operations. The same rules required domestically do not apply when agencies are operating overseas, he said, so the agencies can be forced to make up the rules as they go along. Speaking about the Drug Enforcement Agencys money laundering activities, he said: Its a slippery slope. If its not careful, the

United States could end up helping the bad guys more than hurting them. Shown copies of the documents, a Justice Department spokesman did not dispute their authenticity, but declined to make an official available to speak about them. But in a written statement, the D.E.A. strongly defended its activities, saying that they had allowed the authorities in Mexico to kill or capture dozens of high-ranking and midlevel traffickers. Transnational organized groups can be defeated only by transnational law enforcement cooperation, the agency wrote. Such cooperation requires that law enforcement agencies often from multiple countries coordinate their activities, while at the same time always acting within their respective laws and authorities. The documents make clear that it can take years for these investigations to yield results. They show that in 2007 the authorities infiltrated Mr. Poveda-Ortegas operations. Mr. Poveda-Ortega was considered the principal cocaine supplier to the Mexican drug cartel leader Arturo Beltran Leyva. Two years later, Mexican security forces caught up with and killed Mr. Beltran Leyva in a gunfight about an hour outside of Mexico City. As for Mr. Poveda-Ortega, in 2008 he escaped a raid on his mansion outside Mexico City in which the authorities detained 15 of his associates and seized hundreds of thousands of dollars, along with two pet lions. But the authorities finally captured him in Mexico City in November 2010. According to the newly obtained documents, Mexico agreed to extradite Mr. Poveda-Ortega to the United States last May. But the American authorities refused to say whether the extradition had occurred. Thats how long these investigations take, said an American official in Mexico who would speak only on the condition that he not be identified discussing secret law enforcement operations. They are an enormously complicated undertaking when it involves money laundering, wires, everything. The documents, which read in some parts like a dry legal affidavit and in others like a script for a B-movie, underscore that complexity. They mix mind-numbing lists of dates and amounts of illegal wire transfers that were conducted during the course of the investigation. One scene described in the documents depicts the informant making deals to launder money during meetings with traffickers at a Mexico City shopping mall. Another describes undercover D.E.A. agents in Texas posing as pilots,

offering to transport cocaine around the world for $1,000 per kilo. Those accounts come from the testimony by a D.E.A. special agent who described himself as a 12-year veteran and a resident of Texas. There is also testimony by a Colombian informant who posed as a money launderer and began collaborating with the D.E.A. after he was arrested on drug charges in 2003. The Times is withholding the agents and the informants names for security reasons. In January 2007, the informant reached out to associates of Mr. Poveda-Ortega and began talking his way into a series of money-laundering jobs each one bigger than the last that helped him win the confidence of low-level traffickers and ultimately gain access to the kingpins. A handful of undercover D.E.A. agents, according to the documents, posed as associates to the informant, including the two who offered their services as pilots and another who told the traffickers that he had several businesses that gave him access to bank accounts that the traffickers could use to deposit and disperse their drug money. In June 2007, the traffickers bit, asking the informant to give them an account number for their deposits. And over a four -day period in July, they transferred tens of thousands of dollars at a time from money exchange houses in Mexico into an account the D.E.A. had established at a Bank of America branch in Dallas. According to the testimony, the traffickers deposits totaled $1 million. And on the traffickers instructions, the informant withdrew the money and the D.E.A. arranged for it to be delivered to someone in Panama. Testimony by the informant suggests that the traffickers were pleased with the service. At the beginning of August 2007, Harry asked my help receiving $3 million to $4 million in American money to be laundered, the informant testified, referring to one of the Colombian traffickers involved in the investigation. During subsequent recorded telephone calls I told Harry I couldnt handle that much money. Still, the informant and the D.E.A. tried to keep up. On one occasion, they enlisted a Mexican undercover law enforcement agent to pick up $499,250 from their trafficking targets in Mexico City. And a month later, that same agent picked up another load valued at more than $1 million. The more the money flowed, the stronger the relationship became between the informants and the traffickers. In one U.S. page 3

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Federal Criminal

FBI Pushes to Classify Undercover Animal Abuse Investigations as Terrorism

McNabb Associates, P.C. (Federal Criminal Defense Lawyers)
Submitted at 12:44 PM January 9, 2012

International Business Times Australia on January 9, 2012 released the following: By Natural News (NaturalNews) The USA Patriot Act, the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), and various other unconstitutional anti-terrorism legislation all appear to be getting turned right back around on the American people. It has been revealed that the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has been keeping files on animal rights activists who conduct undercover investigations of factory farms, and the agency is now recommending that these activists be prosecuted as terrorists. Most of the video footage that has captured things like chickens stacked in endless rows of filthy battery cages, or pigs being beaten and forced mercilessly through food processing machines was captured by individuals who did so under cover, often having to lie to the farm owners to gain entry. This act of civil disobedience has been crucial in exposing extreme abuse, and in giving the public a glimpse into how animals raised for commercial consumption are treated. These undercover investigations, of course, have also led many consumers to either stop eating meat altogether, or

purchase meat from small-scale, family farms that raise their animals with dignity, and that allow them to live normal lives outside and on pastures, instead of in large, densely-packed warehouses and feedlots where the animals often never see the light of day. In 2006, Congress passed the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act (AETA), which proponents insisted was only aimed at animal rights groups that burn down buildings, for instance, or commit various other legitimate property crimes. But now that the legislation is law, the FBI wants to use it to target those who merely try to expose what goes on behind the scenes at some of the nations largest and most well -known factory farms. According to the FBI, filming horrendous conditions at factory farms can cause said farms to experience economic loss, which the agency says fits the parameters of AETAs terrorist activity. In other words, the mere act of taking pictures or capturing video at factory farms is a reasonable indication, according to the FBI, that an individual has violated AETA. In order to combat the FBIs egregious efforts in this matter, the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) has filed a lawsuit in Massachusetts challenging the constitutionality of AETA, which can be so broadly defined as to criminalize

protesting and free speech. The group says the bill is unconstitutional and in violation of the First Amendment, as well as the constitutional right to due process (http://ccrjustice.org/newsroom/ news/lawsuit-challenges-animal-enterprise -terror-law-unconstitutional). Douglas McNabb McNabb Associates, P.C.s Federal Criminal Defense Attorneys Videos: Federal Crimes Be Careful Federal Crimes Be Proactive Federal Crimes Federal Indictment To find additional federal criminal news, please read Federal Crimes Watch Daily. Douglas McNabb and other members of the U.S. law firm practice and write and/ or report extensively on matters involving Federal Criminal Defense, INTERPOL Red Notice Removal, International Extradition and OFAC SDN Sanctions Removal. The author of this blog is Douglas McNabb. Please feel free to contact him directly at mcnabb@mcnabbassociates.com or at one of the offices listed above.

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candid conversation, the traffickers boasted about who was able to move the biggest loads of money, the way fishermen brag about their catches. One said he could easily move $4 million to $5 million a month. Then the others spoke about the tricks of the trade, including how they had used various methods, including prepaid debit cards and an Herbalife account, to move the money. The next day, the informant was summoned to his first meeting in Mexico City with Mr. Poveda-Ortega and Mr. Beltran Leyva, who asked him to help them ship a 330-kilogram load to Spain from Ecuador. The documents say the shipment was transported over two weeks in October, with undercover Ecuadorean agents retrieving the cocaine from a tour bus in Quito and American agents testing its purity in Dallas before sending it on to

Madrid. The testimony describes the informant reassuring the traffickers in code, using words like girlfriend or chick to refer to the cocaine, and saying that she had arrived just fine. But in reality, the testimony indicates, the Spanish authorities, tipped off in advance by the D.E.A., seized the load shortly after its arrival, rather than risk losing it. Douglas McNabb McNabb Associates, P.C.s Federal Criminal Defense Attorneys Videos: Federal Crimes Be Careful Federal Crimes Be Proactive Federal Crimes Federal Indictment Federal Crimes Detention Hearing

To find additional federal criminal news, please read Federal Crimes Watch Daily. Douglas McNabb and other members of the U.S. law firm practice and write and/ or report extensively on matters involving Federal Criminal Defense, INTERPOL Red Notice Removal, International Extradition and OFAC SDN Sanctions Removal. The author of this blog is Douglas McNabb. Please feel free to contact him directly at mcnabb@mcnabbassociates.com or at one of the offices listed above.

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Craig Baxam Arrested for Allegedly Attempting to Provide Material Support to al-Shabab
McNabb Associates, P.C. (Federal Criminal Defense Lawyers)
Submitted at 2:13 PM January 9, 2012

(Photo: CBS) CBS News on January 9, 2012 released the following: FBI: Ex-soldier tried to aid terrorists GREENBELT, Md. A former soldier from Maryland has been charged with attempting to provide material support to a terrorist organization in Somalia. Federal prosecutors in Maryland say 24year-old Craig Baxam was arrested Friday. He is charged with attempting to provide support to al-Shabab by trying to join its ranks. Prosecutors said Baxam, who was born in Maryland, was in the army from 2007 to July 2011, and served in Baghdad and Korea after having received advanced cryptology and intelligence training. Prosecutors said that Baxam had no religious affiliation until he converted to Islam several days before leaving the Army, in July 2011. The criminal complaint says that Baxam was surfing the Internet and came upon an Islamic website and read about the Day of

Judgment, and searched for more information on Islam. After leaving the service, he sought to migrate to an Islamic land where he could live under and defend sharia law. He destroyed his home computer and purchased a round-trip ticket to Kenya. In December, as Baxam traveled on a bus in Kenya, he raised suspicions of a fellow passenger and was arrested by authorities, who suspected Baxam was traveling to Somalia to join al-Shabab. He was interviewed by FBI agents in Kenya and arrested on his return to Maryland. Baxam faces a maximum sentence of 15 years in prison if convicted, followed by

three years of supervised release. Douglas McNabb McNabb Associates, P.C.s Federal Criminal Defense Attorneys Videos: Federal Crimes Be Careful Federal Crimes Be Proactive Federal Crimes Federal Indictment Federal Crimes Detention Hearing To find additional federal criminal news, please read Federal Crimes Watch Daily. Douglas McNabb and other members of the U.S. law firm practice and write and/ or report extensively on matters involving Federal Criminal Defense, INTERPOL Red Notice Removal, International Extradition and OFAC SDN Sanctions Removal. The author of this blog is Douglas McNabb. Please feel free to contact him directly at mcnabb@mcnabbassociates.com or at one of the offices listed above.