The allegations about Al Qaeda and ties to Mr. bin Laden have faded in importance to the case, the filings from lawyers on both sides have indicated. It now appears that the prosecutors will not even mention the supposed $20 million delivery to Mr. bin Laden.
The trial is expected to focus far more than had been expected on the sheik's ties to Hamas, a group that has been labeled a terrorist organization by the United States government, but that also has charitable operations.
The Sheik's lawyer told Newsday:
"The government has acted outrageously and unethically by trumpeting charges that it was not prepared to prove," said al-Moayad's attorney, William Goodman. "Now they're hanging by their fingernails."
The charges relating to Osama were supported by a confidential informant who later set himself on fire outside the White House trying to kill himself because the believed the FBI had lied to him.
...as the trial approaches for Sheik Mohammed Ali Hasan al-Moayad, the jurors are unlikely to hear that spectacular allegation. Its sole source, an FBI informant from Yemen, set himself on fire in front of the White House late last year, and it is all but certain prosecutors will not put him on the stand.
The Washington Post reported all the details. Also, Ashcroft didn't tell the whole story. As the Newsday article reports:
The government's case depends largely on transcripts of recorded conversations in the hotel room. The transcripts support another of Ashcroft's allegations, that al-Moayad claimed to be bin Laden's spiritual adviser.
What Ashcroft did not say, however, was that al-Moayad said on the tapes that his relationship dated to the years when bin Laden was battling Soviet forces in Afghanistan, a cause he shared with the United States. The relationship ended before bin Laden turned against America, al-Moayad said.
Al-Moayad also was recorded boasting of his ties to Hamas militants, promising to give the group money and even handing over receipts for donations to Palestinian charities al-Moayad said helped battle Israel....In Yemen, however, it would not be unusual if al-Moayad, a hardline member of Yemen's Islamist Islah party who runs a charitable foundation in the capital city of Sana'a, was a Hamas supporter, said Abdul Hakim al-Eryani, deputy chief of mission in Yemen's Washington embassy. "If he did he wouldn't be breaking any laws in Yemen," al-Eryani said.
Goodbye, Mr. Ashcroft. Between the non-terror cases (here and here, for example), the overturned Detroit terror case, the Patriot Act and your (thankfully) mostly unsuccesful attempts to get more death verdicts in federal cases against the advice of your own prosecutors, you've left quite a legacy--one of a bumbling holy warrior.
