Chicago, April 6 (Inditop.com) A Pakistan-born Chicago cab driver has pleaded not guilty to charges that he attempted to aid Al Qaeda by sending money to Ilyas Kashmiri, a terrorist leader believed to be in Pakistan.
Raja Lahrasib Khan, 56, a naturalised American citizen, appeared briefly before US District Judge James B. Zagel here Monday to enter his not guilty plea then returned to the Metropolitan Correctional Centre where he is being held without bond at government request.
The judge set May 5 as the date for next hearing. Khan claims to have known Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami chief Kashmiri for 15 years. Kashmiri in turn is linked with Mumbai terror suspect David Coleman Headley.
Headley, who has pleaded guilty, and co-accused Pakistani-Canadian Tahawwur Rana are also detained at the Correctional Centre.
Members of Khan’s family, including his son Omar and wife Diane, and several cab drivers attended the hearing to show their support for Khan.
Khan came to the US in 1975 and became a naturalised citizen in 1998. He has three children from his previous marriage and has been married to an American since 1994.
An affidavit accompanying a criminal complaint filed earlier says Khan discussed with an unnamed associate a plan to attack an unspecified stadium in August, possibly using bags containing remote controlled bombs. “Boom, boom, boom, boom,” it quotes him as saying.
The indictment says nothing about an attack on a stadium. It merely says Khan twice sent money intended as aid for Osama bin Laden’s terrorist network.
According to the affidavit, Khan sent $950 on Nov 23, 2009, to an individual in Pakistan for delivery to Kashmiri. The complaint said Khan believed Kashmiri was getting his orders from bin Laden, and that Khan sent the money after Kashmiri indicated he needed cash to buy explosives.
On March 17, Khan accepted $1,000 from the undercover agent and assured him that the money would be used to purchase weapons and possibly other supplies, the complaint said.
It said that Khan discussed the possibility of sending the money to England with his son. Under the plan, he would meet his son in England, retrieve the money and proceed to Pakistan to deliver it to Kashmiri, authorities said.
Talking to reporters, Khan’s lawyer Thomas Durkin said he will be challenging the government’s allegations that there was an attempt to send money in support of a foreign terrorist organisation, specifically Al Qaeda.
