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Mazen Al-Najjar Deported

Aired August 22, 2002 - 12:04   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: We go now to the unit of South Florida where the legal battle is far from over between their tenured professor and an administration that wants to let him go. Computer engineering professor Sami Al Arian is Palestinian, and university officials accuse him of ties to terror. Al-Arian says he has done nothing wrong. In the meantime, his brother-in-law, accused by the U.S. of supporting terrorists, has been deported.
Here is CNN's Mark Potter.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MARK POTTER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Mazen Al-Najjar, a Palestinian immigrant, always claimed he was an innocent man, not the terrorist supporter and national security threat alleged by the U.S. government.

MAZEN AL-NAJJAR, PALESTINIAN IMMIGRANT: I have never been a threat to security in this country or any other country. I mean, I have never been a member of any Palestinian organization, or any militant organization. I have never practiced violence.

POTTER: Al-Najjar came to the U.S. in 1981 as a student, and overstayed his visa. He settled in Tampa, Florida, raised a family, taught at a university and served as a Muslim cleric. In 1997, after applying for asylum, he was arrested for deportation. The government claimed Al-Najjar, through his associations with an Islamic charity and thinktank helped raise money for the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a U.S.-designated terrorist group.

Federal agents raided the offices after another member of the thinktank returned to the Middle East to become a terrorists leader. No charges against him were ever filed. The government said it had secret evidence, and only showed it to a court, never revealing the source of the details to Al-Najjar or the public. For three and a half years, Al-Najjar remained in jail, until an immigration judge wrote, "The record before the court is devoid of any direct or indirect evidence to support the conclusion that the respondent was meaningfully associated with the Palestinian Islamic Jihad."

On the grounds his due process rights had been violated, Al- Najjar was released in December of 2000 in Braytonton (ph), Florida.

AL-NAJJAR: I hope this is the end of the nightmare. It feels like waking up from the nightmare.

POTTER: But two months after the September 11th attacks, Al- Najjar was rearrested for an alleged visa violation. He was held in solitary confinement for nine months and put in deportation proceedings. His family was recently given a last jailhouse visit before his removal from the country.

NAHLA AL-ARIAN, SISTER: He held our hands, and we started praying, we were all crying. He was crying a lot.

POTTER: Al-Najjar's case drew national attention and sparked an argument over the ethics and constitutionality of secret evidence. Civil libertarians condemned it. Others argued it was necessary to protect U.S. intelligence gathering.

At the center, Mazen Al-Najjar, a man who claimed he was innocent of charges never filed.

Mark Potter, CNN, Miami.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

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