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Detained student said he felt threatened by FBI

Awadallah says 15 to 20 federal agents surrounded him when he returned from classes last September. "I was afraid at that time," he says.

NEW YORK (CNN) -- A Jordanian-born college student, accused of lying about his connections to the September 11 terrorists, told a federal judge Monday he had felt threatened by FBI agents who investigated him.

Osama Awadallah, 21, testified in U.S. District Court in Manhattan at an evidentiary hearing to address defense allegations that the government mistreated him, deprived him of his constitutional rights during his interrogation and arrest and physically abused him behind bars.

When the four-day hearing concluded, Judge Shira Scheindlin reserved her decision and set a trial date for May 20.

She also released Awadallah from his home detention; he had been wearing an electronic ankle monitor.

He was indicted for making two false statements to a grand jury about what he knew about one of the men who flew a hijacked airplane into the Pentagon. Awadallah does not face any terrorism charges.

The student at Grossmont College in El Cajon, California, spent three months in federal detention before being freed on a $500,000 bond in December.

Scheindlin previously granted Awadallah's bail application and called the government's case "not particularly strong." The judge also said the defendant "may have been a victim of coercion and intimidation."

Arrest facts in dispute

FBI agents arrested Awadallah on September 20 on a material witness warrant. Investigators went looking for him after finding a slip of paper with his first name and his old phone number inside a car abandoned at Dulles International Airport in suburban Washington by Nawaf Alhazmi.

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Alhazmi and hijacker Khalid Almidhar were aboard Los Angeles-bound American Airlines Flight 77 that crashed into the Pentagon. They lived in the San Diego area in 2000.

Awadallah was one of three San Diego-area college students thought to be acquainted with the hijackers, sought for questioning and taken into custody after FBI agents found them at their apartment complex.

Awadallah testified he encountered the agents waiting for him when he came home from his morning classes September 20.

"So many agents came out of their cars and surround me," Awadallah said. He estimated there were 15 to 20 agents on the scene. "I was afraid at that time," he said.

FBI agents recalled a lower number, maybe a dozen agents at the scene and denied subjecting Awadallah to any undue pressure.

"He was free to walk away," FBI agent Brian Reilly testified.

FBI agent Aurelia Alston, who led the team, and other agents said Awadallah voluntarily signed consent forms allowing them to search his apartment and car and gave them his computer password: Islam.

Awadallah told the court that agents said if he refused to sign the form, they would "tear up" his home.

Their names in his book

Agents took him to their office and questioned him for six hours that first day. The next day they asked him if he would submit to a polygraph, or lie detector, test.

"'If you don't take the test, it means you are hiding something,'" Awadallah recalled an agent saying. He said he felt he had no choice.

An FBI polygrapher told the court Saturday that some of Awadallah's answers appeared deceptive.

Agents told him "that I had known people would do such a thing on September 11," Awadallah testified. "They told me, 'You are one of the terrorists.'"

Awadallah told the court he had no advance knowledge of the attacks, and he is not charged as having such knowledge. His attorneys have said repeatedly that Awadallah had not seen Alhazmi and Almidhar for nearly a year when the attacks occurred.

The criminal charges against Awadallah stem from the fact that the hijacker's first names, "Nawaf" and "Khalid," were in a writing exercise booklet a Grossmont teacher turned in to authorities.

In his first grand jury appearance, Awadallah conceded knowing Alhazmi and seeing him on more than 30 occasions through December 2000.

But he initially said he did not know anyone named "Khalid" and did not recognize his photograph, which prosecutors say were lies.

Awadallah changed his testimony on those two points five days later before the same grand jury.

Judge Scheindlin rejected defense arguments that Awadallah should never have been indicted since he corrected his testimony in his second grand jury appearance.

If convicted, Awadallah faces a maximum of five years in prison on each perjury count.