FBI: Hempstead man called al-Qaida his 'brothers'
HOUSTON
Barry Walter Bujol was arraigned Tuesday on charges he tried to
supply al-Qaida with personnel, currency and other items. He was
arrested last week after a two-year investigation by the FBI Joint
Terrorism Task Force.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Frances Stacy ordered Bujol be held
without bond until his trial, to be held sometime before the end of
summer.
Bujol, 29, is facing one charge of attempting to provide
material support to a foreign terrorist organization and one charge
of aggravated identity theft. Bujol, who is from Hempstead, which
is located about 50 miles northwest of Houston, faces up to 15
years in prison if convicted.
Joseph Varela, Bujol's attorney, said he could not "comment
intelligently" on the case until he's had a chance to review the
evidence authorities have that would "back up" the charges
against his client.
"This is a very complex case," he said. "What I want people
to remember is the Constitution (protects) everyone accused of a
crime, no matter what that crime is."
A recently unsealed FBI search warrant application described
Bujol as eager to prove his dedication to al-Qaida by engaging in
physical and covert communications training.
He used at least 14 e-mail addresses to hide his activities from
authorities and advocated attacking U.S. facilities where military
weapons were manufactured, according to the court document.
The FBI task force determined Bujol had been e-mailing Anwar
al-Awlaki, a U.S.-born, al-Qaida-linked cleric believed to be
hiding in Yemen.
Al-Awlaki also is believed to have exchanged e-mails with Nidal
Malik Hasan, the Army psychiatrist accused of killing 13 people in
last November's Fort Hood shootings. He is also accused of helping
inspire the Times Square bombing attempt in May and the failed
Christmas Day airline bombing.
In one of the e-mails, al-Awlaki allegedly gave Bujol a document
titled "42 Ways of Supporting Jihad."
According to the search warrant application, Bujol referred to
al-Qaida members in the Arabian peninsula as "brothers" and that
he wanted to "die with the brothers for the cause of Allah, and to
be in Heaven."
Bujol made three unsuccessful attempts during February and March
2009 to travel overseas to Yemen or the Middle East. After this, an
informant working for the FBI befriended Bujol in November 2009,
and Bujol believed the informant was a recruiter of al-Qaida in the
Arabian Peninsula.
Bujol created a secret code that he used to communicate with the
informant and gave himself the Arabic moniker of "Abu Abuadah,"
according to the search warrant application.
The informant had Bujol retrieve items from "dead drops,"
pre-arranged secret locations in public places used to exchange
messages and other items. In one of these dead drops, Bujol
retrieved two false identification cards from a hollowed rock FBI
agents placed in a park, the warrant application said.
The cards were supposedly identification cards issued by the
Transportation Security Administration that Bujol used on May 30 to
gain access to a secure part of a Houston-area port with the
alleged intention of boarding a ship bound for the Middle East, the
court documents said.
Bujol was arrested after he boarded the ship. He had been given
a military-issue compass and other materials that he allegedly
agreed to courier to al-Qaida operatives in a Middle Eastern
country.
The informant had previously given Bujol currency, prepaid
telephone calling cards, mobile telephone SIM cards, global
positioning system receivers and public access-restricted U.S.
military publications, according to the court documents.
Before he was arrested, Bujol told the informant during a May 3
meeting that "if he never saw 'this place' (i.e., the United
States) again it would be fine with him," the warrant application
said.
Bujol told the informant he had left a hidden video recording on
his laptop computer to explain to his wife what he would be doing
overseas, the documents said.
Neighbors at Bujol's apartment complex in Hempstead said Tuesday
that he and his family kept mostly to themselves.
Esmerelda Villanueva said Bujol's wife wouldn't let her daughter
talk to other kids in the complex and that Bujol didn't talk to
anybody.
"I can't believe that would happen here in Hempstead," she
said. "They looked like a normal American family, you would never
think."