This is another tear-jerker from the St. Pete's Times about Sami's brother.
She is required to apply for entry to another country and to check in with the INS monthly.
By GRAHAM BRINK, Times Staff Writer
© St. Petersburg Times
published July 18, 2002
TAMPA -- The Immigration and Naturalization Service has imposed supervision requirements on the wife of an imprisoned former University of South Florida instructor while she awaits deportation.
Fedaa Al-Najjar, whose husband, Mazen Al-Najjar, has been linked to terrorism by the federal government but never charged, will have to check in with the INS every month. She also has to show that she is actively working on finding a country that will accept her as a deportee.
David Cole, an attorney for the Al-Najjars, said both of the Al-Najjars have been working as hard as possible to secure a required travel document and to arrange for another country to take them in. Several countries have already turned them down. The United Arab Emirates, to which the United States officially deported Mazen Al-Najjar, has turned down his request for entry three times, Cole said.
Both of them are waiting to hear from Saudi Arabia, he said. Mazen Al-Najjar remains in solitary confinement in a federal prison in Sumter County.
"If you compare the way the INS is treating this family and any other similarly situated immigrant, the comparison is extremely stark," Cole said.
INS spokesman Rodney Germain said he could not talk about the specifics of the Al-Najjars' case. Germain said it was not uncommon for the INS to impose supervision requirements on people awaiting deportation.
Cole and Mazen Al-Najjar's other attorneys have argued that the government has exceeded the six-month maximum that they can hold someone in Al-Najjar's position. The government prosecutors believe that a later law applies in this case that allows them more flexibility when detaining potential deportees who are a threat to national security.
Mazen Al-Najjar entered the United States from Gaza in 1981 and overstayed his student visa. He has been fighting deportation since 1996.
He and his wife are stateless Palestinians. Mazen Al-Najjar has been linked to terrorism by the federal government, although he has never been charged. In 1997, Mazen Al-Najjar challenged an immigration judge's decision to keep him jailed on the basis of classified evidence allegedly linking him to the terrorist group Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
He spent 31/2 years in jail on the basis of the classified information. In December 2000, then-Attorney General Janet Reno released him after a federal judge ruled his constitutional rights were violated by the government's refusal to share the secret evidence with him.
He was detained again in November and has been in prison since.
Cole said it was possible that Saudi Arabia could accept either of the Al-Najjars, but not both. That would force their three young children, who all are U.S. citizens, to decide which parent to remain with.
"This family might be forced to split up," Cole said.
-- Graham Brink can be reached at (813) 226-3365 or brink@sptimes.com.