Somali terror plot suspect cuts deal with feds

Federal prosecutors have cut a deal with the most recent Somali immigrant charged in the government’s “Operation Rhino” investigation into local support for the terrorist group al-Shabaab.

At a court hearing this morning that lasted barely four minutes, an assistant U.S. attorney and the defense lawyer for Ahmed Hussein Mahamud told a federal magistrate that they expected to finalize a plea bargain later today.

It appears a deal was struck. By mid-afternoon, Chief U.S. District Judge Michael Davis had scheduled a hearing for Monday to allow Mahamud to change his not-guilty plea to guilty.

A spokeswoman for the U.S. attorney’s office said she couldn’t confirm or deny that a plea bargain had been worked out. Defense attorney Rick Mattox didn’t return a phone call.

Mahamud, 27, is accused of two counts of conspiracy, a count of providing material support to terrorists and a single count of providing material support to a Foreign Terrorist Organization.

The last time he appeared in court, at a hearing in July, the courtroom was filled with his supporters and many waited in the hallway outside because there wasn’t room for them inside. This morning’s brief hearing was attended by the defendant, the lawyers, three government workers and a court security officer.

Mahamud, who had lived in Eden Prairie but now lives in Columbus, Ohio, was indicted in June for allegedly aiding al-Shabaab, which is fighting to rule Somalia, an African nation of 9.3 million

people. The group controls much of the southern part of the country; the U.S. government considers it a terrorist organization.

Mahamud was the 20th local person charged in the government’s investigation into the exodus of young Somali men from the Twin Cities to fight for al-Shabaab in Somalia. All but two of those cases stemmed from a probe the FBI dubbed “Operation Rhino.”

If there were a plea bargain, Mahamud would become the seventh defendant to make a deal with the government. Of the others charged, 10 remain fugitive and one awaits trial.

Last year, a jury convicted two Rochester women of raising money for al-Shabaab, and they await sentencing. Their case was not part of Operation Rhino.

Federal prosecutors believe two of the fugitives have died abroad, but their cases remain on the books.

The indictment provided few details of what Mahamud is alleged to have done. It claimed he provided “financial support and personnel” to al-Shabaab in Minnesota “on or about a date unknown, and on or about April 20, 2009, and July 27, 2009.”

The charges didn’t say how much money or how many people he allegedly provided.

Today’s hearing was so Mattox and Assistant U.S. Attorney Charles Kovats Jr. could argue the remaining pre-trial motions. On Jan. 18, Davis had ruled on two major defense motions – a request for access to classified evidence obtained by electronic surveillance, and a motion to suppress evidence obtained from wiretaps on Mahamud’s telephone.

The government had filed a notice saying it planned to use evidence obtained clandestinely under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA. In justifying its actions, prosecutors filed a memorandum that was itself classified; the 46-page unclassified version entered in the public docket had 208 redactions, including the conclusion.

Davis denied Mattox’s request for access to the classified evidence and he refused to suppress evidence gained through wiretaps. Nine days after the judge’s ruling, Mattox sent U.S. Magistrate Franklin Noel a letter saying that Mahamud was waiving all his unheard motions and that the case might soon be resolved.

At today’s hearing, Mattox told Noel that he and the government had discussed a plea bargain, and that “I believe there’ll be a plea agreement presented to us later today.”

Kovats agreed, and told Noel that the government, like the defense, was withdrawing all its pre-trial motions.

The first of the six “Rhino” defendants who have pled guilty so far did so in February 2009, but to date only one has been sentenced. That was a Chanhassen surgical technician who admitted her made false statements to the FBI. In July 22010, he was sentenced to four months behind bars and four months of home detention.

After Mahamud was charged and taken into custody, Noel released him to a halfway house in St. Paul. Later, he let him return to Ohio for the birth of his first child.

Somalia has been in anarchy since civil war erupted in 1988 and the government fell in a coup three years later. Since then, different factions have battled the U.N.-backed Transitional Federal Government for control the country.

Al-Shabaab controls much of southern Somalia, including some key ports, while the transitional government controls a small portion of the capital of Mogadishu.

For a time, al-Shabaab had control of Mogadishu, too, but in 2006, the transitional government brought in troops from neighboring Ethiopia to regain the capital. Some Somalis viewed the foreign troops as invaders.

Al-Shabaab issued a call for fighters to repel the troops, whom they branded infidels. (Somalia is predominately Muslim; Ethiopia is largely Christian.) The FBI claimed the recruitment stretched to Minnesota, home of an estimated 32,000 Somali immigrants.

Starting in 2007, some young Somali men living in the Twin Cities began leaving to train with al-Shabaab. Federal officials have declined to say how many traveled abroad, but have said it was more than 20.

In February 2008, the U.S. State Department designated al-Shabaab as a Foreign Terrorist Organization, making it illegal to provide it money or other aid.

The transitional government retook portions of Mogadishu in 2009, and Ethiopian troops left the country.

TwinCities.com