Perils of profiling
There was a Computer Science Ph.D. student at the University of Idaho in Moscow, Idaho called Sami, and he had to suffer the perils of profiling because he was guilty of being a Muslim in the post 9/11 America. This is what can happen if a minority community as a whole is looked upon with suspicion and made to prove their innocence continuously.
Sami Omar Al-Hussayen was a perfectly ordinary graduate student minding his business and family, and in his spare time working for the local Islamic group. The 9/11 attacks outraged him enough to publicly condemn the attacks as an affront to Islam, he organized a candlelight vigil, and even a blood drive.
He being a computer science student volunteered with the Islamic Assembly of North America (IANA), an outreach group, and designed and maintained several websites for them. In that web site he had links to other Islamic web sites in the same way many web sites provide links to other sites.
In 2003 he was arrested by FBI and charged with providing “material support” for terrorist acts of “murder, maiming, kidnapping, and the destruction of property” -- serious stuff, enough to get put away for life. A range of other charges were tacked on as well.
He was put in jail for more than a year before the trial would begin, a year of his life he will never get back.
The FBI claimed their case against Sami was the result of a two year of thorough investigation and that there was a mountain of evidence. But, in the trial they could provide nothing that linked Al-Hussayen or the IANA websites to terrorism. The best evidence prosecution provided was four fatwas on another website, to which there was a link from the IANA website that Sami maintained, that is it, that is all of it.
After the trial the jury acquitted Sami of the serious charges but were deadlocked on some minor charges that related to immigration. The only defense witness, Frank Anderson, a former CIA official later said he was ashamed that FBI kept a decent and innocent man in jail for a very long time.
The long and short of it, the government dropped the immigration in exchange for Sami to be deported back to Saudi Arabia. He could never finish his Ph.D. though he was very near completing his thesis.
One may say this is an isolated case, but sadly it is not. This is the daily reality of Muslims in the west, one wrong glance, a misinterpretation, looking suspicious, boom, you are fighting for your life not knowing what hit you. Sadly, from what I am reading here from educated middle-class people, this may be a reality in India as well.
When we profile there is peril. We could be victims of it if we condone it when we are not the victims.
Cheers!
Please google sami omar al-hussayen case for more information....
