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Prosecutor: Bombing defendants did 'evil acts'

From Phil Hirschkorn
CNN Washington Bureau

NEW YORK (CNN) -- A federal prosecutor said in closing arguments Tuesday that the four defendants in the embassy bombing trial have committed "evil" and "unjust acts that demand accountability."

Assistant U.S. Attorney Ken Karas began with a short video clip showing the aftermath of the explosions at the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania that killed 224 people, including 12 Americans, and injured thousands of others on August 7, 1998.

The tape is a "painful symbol, a painful reminder of why we have spent the past two and half months together," Karas said.

CASE FILE Shattered Diplomacy: The U.S. Embassy Bombings Trial An in-depth special report on the trial of four men charged with the embassy bombings Trial reports | Timeline | Key Figures   GALLERY Images from the U.S. embassy bombing in Tanzania

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He then began what he termed a methodical summary of the government's case as outlined in more than 300 counts of the indictment.

"Let's roll up our sleeves. Let's go through the evidence, and let's begin our search for justice," Karas said.

The government called more than 90 witnesses during nine weeks of testimony and introduced hundreds of exhibits as evidence.

Prosecutors allege the defendants were following orders of Osama bin Laden, the multimillionaire Saudi exile based in Afghanistan. Bin Laden leads an Islamic militant group, al Qaeda, which the U.S. government blames for the embassy bombings and suspects in other violent acts aimed at Americans during the past decade.

Wadih El Hage, 40, a naturalized American from Lebanon, is not accused of a direct role in the embassy bombings, but he is alleged to have facilitated the East African cell that carried out the attacks.

Mohamed Rashed Daoud al-'Owhali, 24, from Saudi Arabia, and Mohamed Sadeek Odeh, 36, from Jordan, allegedly participated in the embassy attack in Kenya in which 213 people died, including 12 Americans.

Khalfan Khamis Mohamed, 27, from Tanzania, allegedly participated in the attack in Tanzania in which 11 people died the same day.

Karas described el Hage as a "facilitator" of the conspiracy who lived a double life in Kenya after moving there in 1994. While he engaged in businesses such as dealing in gemstones and lived with his wife and six children, Karas said, el Hage also became a leader of al Qaeda's Kenyan cell that carried out the bombings.

It was el Hage, Karas said, who visited bin Laden in Afghanistan in early 1997, 16 months before the bombings, and brought back orders to militarize the cell.

Karas called Odeh, who joined al Qaeda in 1992 and underwent arms and explosives training, a "technical adviser" to the bombings.

Odeh ran a fishing business on the Kenyan coast set up by al Qaeda's military commander, Karas told the jury. In the spring and summer of 1998, Odeh attended several meetings with the men who carried out the Kenya attack, Karas said.

Recapping the evidence, Karas said that in the days before the attack Odeh stayed at the same Nairobi hotel the alleged bombers did, registering under a fake name with a fake passport.

Karas said al-'Owhali, who also trained in al Qaeda's camps, helped execute the attack in Kenya after personally asking bin Laden for a mission. Karas reminded jurors that evidence shows al-'Owhali rode in the bomb truck in Kenya and that "the plan called for him to die and he ran."

Karas said that Mohamed, according to the evidence, bought the jeep used to transport Tanzania bomb components and rented the house in Dar es Salaam that was "the bomb factory."

Karas reviewed the detailed history of al Qaeda as recounted particularly by two government witnesses who defected from the group. It was in 1990, after U.S. troops were deployed to Saudi Arabia when Iraq had invaded Kuwait, that bin Laden began targeting Americans, he said.

In religious decrees and media interviews, bin Laden preached that is was a "duty to do anything to drive Americans off of Saudi Arabia, to kill them wherever they are. And that's precisely what al Qaeda did," Karas said.

An early move was to train Somalia tribes to fight the U.S. troop presence in that country in 1993, Karas said. Odeh was among those al Qaeda members that went to Somalia, he said.

"The bottom line was, Americans had to be attacked," Karas said.

Karas spent a substantial amount of time focusing on el Hage, who allegedly has the longest association with bin Laden of any of the defendants. When he worked for bin Laden companies in Sudan, Karas said, el Hage was a "gatekeeper" to bin Laden and managed his payroll.

"The business is part of the jihad," Karas said, adding that the companies provided "terrific cover."

El Hage, Karas said, facilitated the purchase of a private plane for bin Laden that testimony showed was bought to ship Stinger missiles from Pakistan to Sudan, and to ferry al Qaeda operatives to Somalia.

In Kenya, el Hage's facilitating role included making fake travel documents for al Qaeda members, Karas said. Among the passport-size photos found in el Hage's files was the photo of a leading operative who conducted surveillance of the U.S. embassy, Karas said.

Karas told the jury that proof of el Hage's ongoing ties to bin Laden lie in records of bin Laden's satellite telephone, purchased for him in November 1996. The fourth outgoing call went to el Hage, and he received others, records show.

The number, posted on a big chart on an easel in front of the jury, appears several times in el Hage's address books and the address books of other indicted conspirators not currently on trial.

"That phone is the jihad phone," Karas said. "Who they call on that phone and who has that number tells you a great, great deal."

Prosecutors are expected to spend two and a half days on closing arguments. Each defense team predicts it will need about half a day.

U.S. District Judge Leonard Sand's instructions to the jury are expected to be given next week, followed by jury deliberations. The jury will not be sequestered.

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U.S. State Department
 •  International Information Programs:
 •  Counterterrorism
 •  Links to United States Embassies and Consulates Worldwide
Patterns of Global Terrorism: 1999
FBI Websites Document Evidence Against Bin Laden
Ussamah Bin Laden
US District Court, Southern District of New York
Terrorism Research Center

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