Posted on 12/29/2008 5:47:28 PM PST by Cindy
December 29, 2008
Note: The following text is a quote:
http://www.usdoj.gov/opa/pr/2008/December/08-nsd-1151.html
Former Maryland Man Charged with Conspiracy to Act as an Iraqi Agent
Defendant Allegedly Worked for the Government of Iraq and Assisted the Iraqi Intelligence Service
WASHINGTON – A criminal complaint was filed today charging Mouyad Mahmoud Darwish, age 47, formerly of Maryland, with conspiring to act as an agent of a foreign government, specifically, as an agent of Iraq, announced United States Attorney for the District of Maryland Rod J. Rosenstein and Patrick Rowan, Assistant Attorney General for National Security.
Darwish is a Canadian citizen born in Iraq. During part of the alleged conspiracy, he resided in Maryland. According to the affidavit filed in support of the criminal complaint, under the regime of Saddam Hussein, the Iraqi Intelligence Service (IIS) routinely recruited individuals, either currently in the United States or to be placed into the United States, to support the IIS and the Government of Iraq. Following the invasion of Iraq by coalition forces in March 2003, the United States military obtained confidential IIS documents establishing that Darwish provided information to officials of the Government of Iraq and intelligence officers with the IIS.
The seized documents also established that Darwish received payments from the IIS and the Iraqi government as compensation for his assistance and information. For example, an IIS document indicated that Darwish had provided information he received from a source of Iraqi descent that Iraqi volunteers, including the source, were being trained by the U.S. military in Virginia. Another document identifies Darwish as an employee of the Iraqi Interests Section (ISEC), formed in 1991 within the Algerian Embassy in Washington, D.C., after the U.S. severed diplomatic relations with Iraq for invading Kuwait.
Specifically, according to the affidavit, throughout the conspiracy Darwish performed tasks at the Iraqi Embassy and at the ISEC. For example, the affidavit alleges that from 2000 through March or April of 2004, Darwish was working full-time at the ISEC as an assistant to the accountant and as a driver, for which he was paid $1,500 per month. Darwish also had obtained a work visa for a position as a cook at a restaurant in Maryland during that time frame, in an effort to legally remain in the United States.
According to the affidavit, in January 2004, a co-conspirator asked that Darwish locate and destroy any ISEC files associated with the conspirator, in an effort to conceal that person’s ISEC activities and Ba’ath Party membership. While attempting to locate the files, Darwish learned that the files had already been destroyed and shared this information with his co-conspirators. Darwish also is alleged to have told his conspirators about his employment activities at the Iraqi Embassy and the ongoing activities in the United States of the Iraqi ambassador and other Iraqi government officials who were associated with the interim government following the downfall of the Saddam Hussein regime.
Darwish also is alleged to have attended social gatherings at the Iraqi Embassy and the ISEC, which were used to recruit individuals to work for the IIS; to interact with individuals who were already working with the IIS and Saddam Hussein’s regime; and to maintain the loyalties of the participants to the Ba’ath Party and Saddam Hussein’s regime.
Darwish was never recognized by the Department of State or the Attorney General of the United States as a diplomatic or consular officer of the Government of Iraq, or officially or publicly acknowledged and sponsored as an official, representative, or employee of Iraq.
According to the affidavit, from October 2001 through 2006 Darwish sought to obtain lawful permanent residence in the United States and filed documents in support of his application. Darwish never revealed his affiliation with the Ba’ath Party or the government of Iraq in applications to the United States Immigration and Naturalization Service (now United States Citizenship and Immigration Services) for residency status in the United States, nor did he reveal his employment with the ISEC/Iraqi Embassy from 2000 through early 2004, instead claiming that he first entered the United States on June 15, 2001 for the sole purpose of working at a restaurant in Maryland as a cook.
On May 20, 2003, during an interview with FBI agents, Darwish made numerous misrepresentations regarding his presence in the United States, including asserting that he arrived in the United States in May 2001; that he performed manual labor tasks such as mowing the lawn and making minor repairs for the ISEC; and that he had no knowledge of the intelligence activities being conducted by, or at, the ISEC.
Darwish faces a maximum sentence of five years in prison for conspiracy to act as an agent for a foreign government. He had an initial appearance earlier today in Buffalo, New York, on that charge. A detention hearing has been scheduled for tomorrow morning in Buffalo. Darwish was detained by immigration officials in Buffalo on December 24, 2008 when he attempted to enter the United States from Canada. No court appearance has been scheduled yet in Maryland.
United States Attorney Rod J. Rosenstein thanked the Federal Bureau of Investigation and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement for their investigative work. Mr. Rosenstein commended Assistant United States Attorney Christine Manuelian, who is prosecuting the case, as well as Senior Trial Attorneys Robert E. Wallace and Clifford I. Rones, from the Counterespionage Section of the Justice Department’s National Security Division, who provided assistance in the case, and Assistant United States Attorney Harvey E. Eisenberg, Chief of National Security, who supervised this case.
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http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3646945,00.html
(AP)
“Canadian citizen charged with spying for Iraq”
Published: 12.30.08, 03:09 / Israel News
ARTICLE SNIPPET: “An Iraq-born Canadian citizen who was picked up at the US border last week was charged Monday with conspiring to spy for Saddam Hussein and Iraq.
A criminal complaint filed by the US Justice Department alleges that Mouyad Mahmoud Darwish, 47...”
BTTT
Thank you Jet Jaguar.
Pathetic potential sentence. We all know he will walk without serving any real time.
MARCH 11, 2004 : (ARREST OF SUSAN LINDHAUER - See SPIES FOR IRAQ) Yesterday’s [March 11, 2004] arrest of Lindauer was based on an indictment filed in U.S. District Court in Manhattan and alleges Lindauer made multiple visits from October 1999 through March 2002 to the Iraqi Mission to the United Nations in Manhattan.
Lindauer allegedly met there with several members of the Iraqi Intelligence Service, the foreign intelligence arm of the government of Iraq that allegedly has played a role in several terrorist operations, including the attempted assassination of former President George H.W. Bush.
The [March 11, 2004] indictment states Lindauer accepted payments from the Iraqis for her services and expenses amounting to a total of $10,000, including $5,000 she received during a trip to Baghdad in early 2002.
Lindauer is also accused of meeting twice with an undercover FBI agent who posed as a Libyan intelligence representative who was seeking to support resistance groups in postwar Iraq. Lindauer allegedly discussed the need for plans and foreign resources to support the groups. ———— “Alleged spy for Iraq gave Lockerbie deposition,Former Democrat congressional aide was at center of CIA controversy” By Sherrie Gossett, WorldNetDaily.com, Friday, March 12, 2004
MARCH 11, 2004 Thursday : (TAKOMA PARK, MARYLAND : SUSAN LINDHAUER IS ARRESTED - See IRAQ, LIBYA) Lindauer, 41, was arrested in her hometown of Takoma Park, Md. She made a brief court appearance in Baltimore yesterday [March 11, 2004 Thursday], where lawyers argued over whether she should be granted bail, AP reported
I’m an anti-war activist and I’m innocent,” Lindauer told WBAL-TV outside the Baltimore FBI office. “I did more to stop terrorism in this country than anybody else. I have done good things for this country. I worked to get weapons inspectors back to Iraq when everyone else said it was impossible.” ———— “Alleged spy for Iraq gave Lockerbie deposition,Former Democrat congressional aide was at center of CIA controversy” By Sherrie Gossett, WorldNetDaily.com, Friday, March 12, 2004
SHAABAN HAFIZ AHMAD ALI SHAABAN aka SHAABAN HAFED aka JOE H BROWN [INDIANA TRUCKER WHO ACTED AS AN AGENT FOR SADDAM HUSSEIN’S INTELLIGENCE AGENCY THE IIS]INDIANAPOLIS — A Greenfield man has been indicted on accusations he tried to sell the names of U.S. intelligence agents to Iraq before the 2003 fall of Saddam Hussein’s regime. Authorities: Man Was In Iraq In ‘02 Shaaban Hafiz Ahmad Ali Shaaban, a 52-year-old naturalized U.S. citizen, was arrested Thursday after an investigation of more than a year by the FBI and other agencies, U.S. Attorney Susan W. Brooks said. Shaaban, also known as Shaaban Shaaban Hafed and Joe H. Brown, is suspected of going to Iraq in 2002 and making a deal to sell the names. He isn’t accused... ——— Indiana Man Charged With Trying To Sell Secrets To IraqThe Indy Channe; ^ | March 3, 2005 Friday, March 04, 2005 3:49:51 AM · by Samwise · 34 replies · 1,268+ views
Yet another Iraqi spy case [Dumeisi], this one neatly hidden in Fitzies’ file:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1050247/posts
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