...I'm okay with being REALITY-based.




Wednesday, June 09, 2004
      ( 11:50 AM )
 
Keeping America Safe from Homework

If you don't live in Oregon, you may have only briefly heard the news story that a citizen of Portland, Brandon Mayfield, had been arrested in connection with the Madric bombings. Now, of course the Justice Department says that he wasn't "arrested" - rather, he was held as a material witness - without counsel, without visitation, without contact with the outside world. Supposedly, his fingerprint was found on a plastic bag connected with the bombing in Madrid and he was a suspect. What may have added to their rabid hatred of him and determination to put him away was that he is an outspoken attorney, a white man who converted to Islam, is very devout, and he happened to defend one of the Portland Seven in a child custody case a few years ago. Get him!

Of course, we all know that they had to release him and the FBI issued a public apology for holding him because of course it WASN'T his fingerprint. But what we learn now is that they knew it wasn't his fingerprint even before they imprisoned him. What's more, the items they listed on his indictment were completely fabricated out of the air (I know - you're shocked).

When the FBI went through Brandon Mayfield's possessions to investigate his connection with the Madrid train bombings, agents seized what they called "miscellaneous Spanish documents."

As The New York Times reported, Mayfield's family later identified the documents as his children's Spanish homework.

Yep, that's right. They used his children's Spanish homework as evidence that he conspired to bomb Madrid. Do you think this could never happen to you?

But by April 13, according to the Times, the Spanish told the FBI that the match was "conclusively negative." In a meeting with the FBI in Spain April 21, Spanish officials insisted there was no match, while FBI agents insisted there was -- but never asked to see the actual bag.

By then, the FBI had found that Mayfield was a Muslim convert, that he was often seen driving to the Bilal Mosque, and that he had represented, in a child custody suit, one of the Portland Seven convicted terrorists.

[...]

But Mayfield was arrested May 6, after the Spanish had rejected the match April 13 and again April 21. He wasn't released until May 20, when the Spanish said they'd matched the fingerprint to someone else.

Just a suggestion, if your kids are thinking of studying a foreign language, you might want to request they do their homework at the library - especially if it's French.

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