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Investigators focus on three detained N.J. men

NEW YORK (CNN) -- Three male immigrants who shared an apartment and worked for the same newsstand company in New Jersey -- and two of whom were in the air on a flight from Newark, New Jersey, at the time of the September 11 terrorist attacks -- are being held in the investigation of those attacks.

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Ayub Ali Khan and Mohamed Jaweed Azmath, Indian immigrants who lived in Jersey City, are material witnesses who have been in custody in New York City since September 12, when they were arrested outside Fort Worth, Texas, on an Amtrak train en route to San Antonio.

Their one-time roommate, Mohamed Aslam Pervez, a naturalized American from Pakistan, is also in custody in New York and has been charged with one count of lying to investigators, according to court federal documents.

On September 11, Khan and Azmath were on a TWA flight from Newark that was forced to land in St. Louis, Missouri, when the Federal Aviation Administration closed the skies to commercial travel after the terrorist skyjackings.

A Fort Worth Police Department report obtained by CNN shows that Khan and Azmath appeared very nervous to questioning officers. They were carrying $5,500 cash, two flat box-cutter type knives, and hair dye, and Azmath had copies of numerous passport photos.

"I did not have anything to do with New York," Azmath exclaimed, according to the report.

"The carotid pulse in his neck was visibly pulsating rapidly and Azmath broke into a sweat above his brow," the report says. "Khan was very nervous and evasive when he was questioned about his travel plans."

According to the Fort Worth police report, Azmath had told officers he was going to see a friend in San Antonio and stay a month. Khan said they were planning to stay only a week.

On the flight from Newark, Azmath and Khan had two checked pieces of luggage and carried a briefcase belonging to Khan and a trash bag. When officers inspected the bag, they "found paraphernalia that could assist in the altering of the appearance of the subjects," the report says. They also found photocopies of Azmath's passports, showing him alternatively clean shaven and with a full beard. There were also receipts for wire transfers, empty cash envelopes with dates written on them, and letters in Arabic.

Three days later, federal agents raided Khan and Azmath's $480 a month apartment on Tonnele Avenue in Jersey City.

"It was a top-to-bottom sweep," said FBI spokeswoman Sandra Carroll. The search occurred weeks before the anthrax scare materialized, and although there were agents with a chemical background on the evidence recovery team, the apartment was not swabbed for chemical residue. Some of the items removed have been tested.

"Evidence at this point does not link that apartment or those individuals to anthrax," Carroll said.

The apartment was left unsecured for some time after September 15. Wall Street Journal reporters walked in and found 1995 issues of Time and U.S. News & World Report with cover stories about biological weapons and the sarin gas attack in Tokyo. As of last week, a padlock had been put on the door, but it was unclear as to whether that had been done by the landlord or the police.

Carroll said, "These gentlemen worked at a magazine stand, there were a number of news articles and a number of editorials that the apartment was completely covered with."

The first anthrax letter mailed from Trenton was postmarked September 18 -- six days after Khan and Azmath were in custody.

Khan and Azmath were employees of the newsstands at Newark's Penn Station, according to Richard Gruber, attorney for the newsstand's owner, Usman Bandukra. Khan worked there for almost five years and Azmath almost for two. Azmath told police in Fort Worth he earned $300 a week.

Both men were laid off as of September 1 when Bandukra's company, S & S, passed over control to Hudson News, although S & S maintains a 50 percent investment.

"They were good employees. We have never heard them say anything un-American or against this country at all," Gruber said. Nor did they travel a lot, Gruber added.

Khan obtained a Social Security card issued in New Jersey between 1994 and 1996, and Azmath obtained a Social Security card issued in New Jersey between 1992 and 1993. Indian authorities have said Khan, 34, and Azmath, 37, had false passports obtained in Mumbai, India, where an Indian Air Flight was hijacked two years ago and where Indian intelligence sources have told CNN an extremist cell exists. Khan and Azmath have sent their families in Hyderabad more than $58,000, Indian sources have said.

Pervez, arrested on September 16, was listed at the same Tonnele Avenue and Kennedy Boulevard addresses in Jersey City as Khan and Azmath. He was also employed by S & S, working at its Trenton newsstand, according to attorney Gruber and FBI's Carroll. Gruber said Pervez worked in Trenton until September 1998 and then shifted to the Newark station.

Pervez allegedly made false statements about checks and money orders that were deposited into his bank account and about checks written from that account. A criminal complaint was filed in the U.S. District Court in Manhattan October 16.

The charge stems from Pervez's testimony on October 10 and 12 before a federal grand jury investigating the September 11 attacks.

The complaint focuses on a total of $63,000 Pervez deposited in 1995, 1996, and 2001, plus $50,000 in checks Pervez wrote in 1996. He told investigators $15,000 he received was to invest in a newsstand on Manhattan's 14th Street but he offered no details to back this up. He also claimed some $11,000 in checks he wrote was to invest in a 7-Eleven store, which never opened, and the money was returned.

In addition to the Jersey City addresses, Pervez once lived near Trenton at an apartment complex in Hamilton Township, New Jersey. The lease, starting August 1, 2000, says Pervez lived there with his wife and two children. Their published telephone number is now disconnected.

The attorney representing Pervez, Charles Lavine, would not comment on the case when reached by CNN.