D.C. Circuit: CAIR Must STAND TRIAL for Massive Fraud

originally posted by: TrueBrit You can dress a fascist up in any suit you like, but it's still an oppressive bitch queen from hell.

The pants suit has a clone?

Hmmmmmm.

a reply to: xuenchen

Pamela Gellar is not a good source.

To say shes incredibly biased and has an agenda is a gross understatement.

The DOJ article says that CAIR was named as an "unindicted co-conspirator" in the Holy Land Foundation trial and that as a result, the FBI was to limit its contact with CAIR, which it failed to do on a few occasions.

Apparently the first trial against the group resulted in a mistrial. They had to do it all over again before they could get any convictions.

It wasnt until the government presented "two anonymous Israeli witnesses" and "evidence" from the IDF that they got convictions... SMH.

I knew nothing about this case until just reading about it and I am truly disgusted with our government.

Not shocked, just disgusted.

After 19 days of deliberations, the 2007 jury was unable to come to a definitive conclusion and the case ended in a mistrial.

While 200 charges were filed against the defendants, the jurors had acquitted on some counts and were deadlocked on charges ranging from tax violations to providing material support for terrorists.

One defendant was acquitted of most of the 32 charges against him.

The New York Times reported: "The decision today is 'a stunning setback for the government, there's no other way of looking at it,' said Matthew D. Orwig, a partner at Sonnenschein Nath & Rosenthal who was, until recently, United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Texas.

'This is a message, a two-by-four in the middle of the forehead,' Orwig said. 'If this doesn’t get their attention, they are just in complete denial,' he said of Justice Department officials, who he said may not have recognized how difficult such cases are to prosecute."[18]

Experts found the jury's inability to come to a definitive conclusion to be evidence of weakness in the government's ability to provide clear enough evidence against the charity.

The LA Times reported that Georgetown University law professor David Cole said: "If the government can shut them down and then not convince a jury the group is guilty of any wrongdoing, then there is something wrong with the process".[19]

"The whole case was based on assumptions that were based on suspicions", said juror Scroggins, who added: "If they had been a Christian or Jewish group, I don't think [prosecutors] would have brought charges against them."[19]

The HLF retrial began on August 18, 2008. The prosecution again presented the two anonymous Israeli witnesses, "Avi" and "Major Lior."[20]

The prosecution also placed into evidence documents that, according to "Major Lior," the IDF had recovered from the Palestinian Authority headquarters in Ramallah during an IDF operation in 2002 known as "Operation Defensive Shield."[21]