A father grieves for his son - and the soldiers he's accused of shooting (Arkansas recruiter)

Commercial Appeal ^ | 3/28/10 | Kristina Goetz

[Libloather]

A father grieves for his son — and the soldiers he's accused of shooting
By Kristina Goetz
Posted March 28, 2010 at midnight

Every other Saturday, Melvin Bledsoe makes a two-hour drive from Memphis to visit the son he still calls by his given name.

For an hour at the Pulaski County Detention Facility in Arkansas, Bledsoe speaks through a vent in the glass that separates him from his youngest child. He reminisces about high school graduation, their father-son trip to South Beach.

"Remember that?" his father coaxes.

Bledsoe studies the face of this dark-haired, brown-eyed 24-year-old in blue prison scrubs and sometimes catches a glimpse of the happy-go-lucky Carlos he raised. Other times, it's Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad, the Muslim convert charged in a shooting at a Little Rock Army recruiting center last summer that killed one soldier and injured another.

That day, two privates who'd recently completed basic training were taking a cigarette break outside when Muhammad drove in front of the building and allegedly opened fire.

Pvt. Quinton Ezeagwula, 18, of Jacksonville, Ark., was wounded. Pvt. William A. Long, 23, of Conway, Ark., was shot dead. Long's mother was in the parking lot and heard the shots. She looked around and saw her son lying on the ground.

Bledsoe wants to understand how his son turned from middle-class Memphis roots to become a self-described member of al-Qaida who waged what he has described as a "jihadi attack on infidel forces."

"I want to know how, who and why this happened to my son," Bledsoe said. "And I say to you, if it happened to my son today, tomorrow it can be your son. This is something the American people need to wake up to. Tomorrow they could be looking for someone with blond hair and blue eyes."

[Libloather]

You blew away an American soldier because you're an idiot. "Remember that?" (If that was my kid, I would kick his behind - glass or no glass.)

Jailed Al-Qaida convert saddens father, who remembers Memphis childhood

[Vigilanteman]

As Michael Savage says “Liberalism is a mental disorder.” So is Islam.

[Bad Jack Bauer]

My father completely disowned me when I went to prison. And I was completely on my own when I got out. Once I proved myself worthy he took me back in and called in every marker he had to get me a pardon. I learned some hard lessons I will never forget thanks to him.

[Jeff Winston]

Unfortunately, his little boy is gone forever.

[Drew68]

Pulaski County prosecutors, who are seeking the death penalty in the case in which Muhammad is charged with capital murder, attempted capital murder and 10 counts of unlawful discharge of a firearm from a vehicle, won't explore his religious beliefs or his claimed extremist ties.

"There's just no need for me to worry about what he says or to try to understand his motivation or anything else," said Pulaski County Prosecutor Larry Jegley. "All I care about is what he did and what I think I can prove that he did. Whether he claims to be a Martian who flew in here on a spaceship or whatever doesn't matter."

But it does matter!

Daris Long, father of the Army private killed in the shooting, has his own questions and criticisms. By classifying his son's death as nonhostile, the federal government has, he said, "abandoned my son on the battlefield."

"Being gunned down in uniform by a self-described Islamic warrior obviously does not rise to the level of a terrorist act as far as I can tell under this administration," the retired Marine officer said. "... The failure to include the death of a serving U.S. soldier and the wounding of another outside an Army office in America's heartland as a terrorist act by a home-grown jihadist who has ties to Yemen himself is beyond me."

Why the deliberate effort on both the prosecution and the government to downplay this? It wasn't just a simple, random murder. It was a deliberate attack on service members. Just because it didn't happen on a battlefield in Afghanistan doesn't make it any less of a combat casualty.

[ExpatGator]

“dark-haired, brown-eyed 24-year-old”

Is this Newspeak for black male?????????????

[doc1019]

Fathers can be great people if given a chance.

[Roses0508]

Don’t you just love that right down at the very end of the article there is finally some reflection on the innocent victim???

Oh, and blaming the FBI?

[Bad Jack Bauer]

Fathers can be great people if given a chance.

A father is all I ever had. Never knew my mom as she died before I could even walk. As hard as the lessons I learned were, I suspect they were always harder on him. He died three years ago. No brothers, no sisters have I so the world is a lonely place

[kcvl]

Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad, the 23-year-old accused of killing a U.S. soldier and injuring another in the attack in Little Rock, was born in Tennessee as Carlos Leon Bledsoe. He reportedly converted to Islam as a teenager, and court records show he changed his name in March 2006.

Muhammad told officers that he would have killed more soldiers if they had been on the parking lot. Muhammad also told police he was a practicing Muslim, and that he was mad at the U.S. military because of what they had done to Muslims in the past.

Boo Freakin Whooo! What do you think your son was doing in Yemen?!

Muhammad was under "preliminary" investigation by the FBI's Joint Terrorism Task Force after visiting Yemen and being arrested there for using a Somali passport — even though he's a U.S. citizen.

Muhammad reportedly "studied jihad with an Islamic scholar" during his visit there, according to JihadWatch.org. And he would not be the first American-born terror suspect believed to have radical ties outside the U.S.

[onyx]

How many people and entities can Mr. Bledsoe blame before he gets around to blaming his own damn monster of a Muslim son?

[doc1019]

The world is only as lonely as you let it be; I spent my early years alone, yet I made it (now 63). Alone without father or mother, in the “system” as a foster kid. Made friends were I could and made the best of life.

Turned our all right. 10 years in the military, and 28 years as a police officer. Not bad for being alone.

[SkipW]

I don’t care anything about his daddy or his momma. I don’t care about his childhood. There should be a trial, a conviction and an execution. That process should not take too long either.

It is offensive to think about this retarded punk sitting around writing appeals and eating food purchased with American tax dollars for the next 25 years.

[Libloather]

Not bad for being alone.

Just got back from a free trip to Las Vegas. Oh, you need to go there PRONTO! Oh, yeah...

[Libloather]

...punk sitting around writing appeals and eating food purchased with American tax dollars for the next 25 years.

The whole piece is a sob story. Say, have ya heard any updates on that insane Hassan fella/terrorist in the past month or so?

[Luke21]

I can’t read this trash.

[SkipW]

I haven’t heard a mumblin word about Hasan the jihadist. It is a safe bet that tis administration doesn’t want to talk about it. The Army is, at least at some level, hoping that the whole thing will just go away.

After all, it was idiots in their particular chain of command who refused to quarantine that Muslim POS. I wish there was some way to pressure the Army to prosecute them for their role in the murder of those people at Fort Hood.