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CNN Live At Daybreak
Officials Keep Bringing Investigation Back to New Jersey
Aired October 30, 2001 - 05:41 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: More now for you on another story that is still taking shape across New Jersey. Remember the men that police took into custody just after the September 11 attacks? Two were on a flight from New Jersey, which was grounded right after the attacks, and as our Deborah Feyerick now tell us, that's not the only time a New Jersey connection has surfaced in the FBI's investigation.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DEBORAH FEYERICK, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Investigators keep coming back to New Jersey, a handful of cities, officials believe, where hijackers helped stage the Pentagon and World Trade Center attacks, and where alleged witnesses have been rounded up for questioning by the FBI.
First, Paterson, New Jersey's third largest city -- suspected hijacking ringleader, Mohammed Atta, traveled there as recently as July, buying a $550 one-way coach Swiss Air ticket from Miami to Madrid.
MUNTHER AMMAR, TRAVEL AGENT: He paid cash money.
FEYERICK: Munther Ammar runs Apollo Travel on Main Street in Paterson. He says he told Atta it would be cheaper to fly from New York. But Atta said he wanted to leave from Miami, from where, he said, he had just arrived.
AMMAR: And he came to the office and, you know, bought the ticket, and he went.
FEYERICK: Investigators will not confirm whether during his New Jersey trip, Atta met with several other suspected hijackers living together in Patterson. Hani Hanjour, Ahmed Alghamdi, and brothers, Nawaf and Salem Alhazmi rented this one-bedroom apartment.
CNN has learned that 11 days before the suicide mission, Hanjour, the alleged skyjack pilot of American Airlines Flight 77, bought a first-class ticket here, at this travel agency, where employees say Hanjour was quiet. That it was another suspected hijacker, Majed Moqed, who did all of the talking, asking that Hanjour be seated as far forward as possible on the scheduled Washington to San Francisco flight, seat 1B behind the cockpit was available, but when Hanjour's VISA card was rejected, the two alleged skyjackers went to Hudson Union Bank a few blocks away. They returned and paid $1,800 in cash, telling the travel agent they chose that flight because the first- class fare to San Francisco was $400 cheaper from Washington, D.C. than from Newark.
(on camera): The travel plans for all of the hijackers were alike in this way: the suspected hijackers did not take off from cities near where they lived. The New Jersey cell flew from Washington, the Florida cell flew from Boston, Portland and Newark, all had one-way tickets.
(voice-over): Two men who did take off from Newark on September 11 have intrigued investigators. Mohammed Jaweed Azmath and Ayub Ali Khan. The two newsstand workers lived on Tonnele Avenue in Jersey City, keeping a mailbox together two doors down from a controversial mosque, where convicted terrorist Sheik Abdel Rahman once preached.
(on camera): After Azmath and Khan's flight was grounded in St. Louis, immediately after the attacks, they hopped an Amtrak train. They were picked up in Fort Worth, Texas. A police report obtained by CNN shows both men were very nervous.
(voice-over): When police told the men they were looking for people with suspicious itineraries, Azmath is quoted as saying, "I did not have anything to do with New York." A police search of his luggage turned up numerous passport photocopies. In each, Azmath looked different, from clean shaven to mustache and full beard.
Police say Khan, meantime, was -- quote -- "evasive when questioned about his itinerary." A search of his briefcase found two box-cutter type knives, an open packet of hair dye and thousands of dollars in cash.
Law enforcement sources say neither man is cooperating with the investigation. A third Jersey City roommate who, at times, lived with Azmath and Khan on Tonnele Avenue is also in custody. Authorities say Mohammed Pervez made false statements to FBI agents about more than $100,000 he moved in and out of bank accounts over several years. His attorney declined comment.
Deborah Feyerick, CNN, Jersey City, New Jersey.
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