Man revealed as bin Laden's bodyguard released by U.S.

[DogPoundPup]

Source: The Miami Herald

GUANTANAMO BAY NAVY BASE, Cuba — Soon after Osama bin Laden's driver got here in 2002, he told interrogators the identity of the al Qaeda chief's most senior bodyguard — then a fellow prison camp detainee.

But, inexplicably, the U.S. let the bodyguard go.

This startling information was revealed in the fourth day of the war crimes trial of Salim Hamdan, 37, facing conspiracy and material support for terror charges as an alleged member of bin Laden's inner circle.

Michael St. Ours, an agent with the Naval Criminal Intelligence Service, NCIS, provided the first tidbit. He testified for the prosecution that his job as a prison camps interrogator in May 2002 was to find and focus on the bodyguards among the detainees.

And Hamdan helped identify 30 of them — 10 percent of the roughly 300 detainees then held here. They had just been transferred to Camp Delta from the crude compound called Camp X-Ray, and U.S. intelligence was still trying to unmask them.

Chief among them was Casablanca-born Abdallah Tabarak, then 47, described by St. Ours as ''a hard individual,'' and, thanks to Hamdan, ``the head bodyguard of all the bodyguards.''

St. Ours said he was eager to speak with Tabarak. But the Moroccan was ''uncooperative,'' and St. Ours moved on to other intelligence jobs — and never learned afterward what became of him.

Then, on cross-examination, Hamdan defense attorney Harry Schneider dropped a bombshell:

''Would it surprise you to learn he was released without ever being charged?'' St. Ours looked stunned.

''Yeah,'' he said.

Read more: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/homepage/story/45505.html

[Greyskye]

1. So they are still holding OBL's driver, but let his bodyguard walk?

[populistdriven]

2. Of course they released him, he was CIA

[Canuckistanian]

3. They've probably wired him

And are holding his family on a floating torture ship.

At this point, NOTHING would surprise me.

[SpiralHawk]

4. "MIHOP. Smirk." - Commander AWOL

[whistle]

5. Was he released into the U.S.?

[Psyop Samurai]

6. Oh goody... the veil just thinned to a QUARTER of a milliliter...

Time to pretend even harder.


_____

alternate Miami Herald link for anyone whose browser crashes on the McClatchy:

http://www.miamiherald.com/news/breaking-news/story/617...

[Psyop Samurai]

7. Oops... uhmm... would you believe "millimeter"?

[cal04]

8. Detainee on trial said boss left Guantanamo

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080725/ap_on_re_la_am_ca/g...

A Moroccan prisoner released from Guantanamo in 2004 was Osama bin Laden's top bodyguard, according to testimony Thursday in the war crimes trial of another alleged bodyguard.

Defendant Salim Hamdan said the Moroccan, Abdellah Tabarak, was head of the al-Qaida chief's security detail, said Naval Criminal Investigative Service agent Michael St. Ours, relating what Hamdan told him in a 2002 interrogation.

St. Ours, who also questioned Tabarak at Guantanamo, said he was surprised to learn from Hamdan's lawyers that the Moroccan had been released because he was a "very hard individual."

Tabarak — Hamdan's reputed boss — was one of five Guantanamo prisoners returned to Morocco in August 2004. At the time, he was suspected of having served as a bodyguard for the al-Qaida leader in Sudan and Afghanistan.

[tanyev]

9. KICK.

[Marrah_G]

10. If the guy isn't already dead he will be soon

"And Hamdan helped identify 30 of them — 10 percent of the roughly 300 detainees then held here."

[Judi Lynn]

11. Update on trial: Bin Laden's driver denies making loyalty oath

Bin Laden's driver denies making loyalty oath
Posted on Wed, Jul. 30, 2008
By MIKE MELIA
Associated Press Writer

GUANTANAMO BAY NAVAL BASE, Cuba -- A former driver for Osama bin Laden denied Wednesday that he had sworn a loyalty oath to the al-Qaida leader, contradicting potentially damaging testimony from a Defense Department interrogator.

Salim Hamdan, a Yemeni, testified at his war crimes trial that a nine-hour interrogation in May 2003 focused almost entirely on whether he swore an Islamic oath, or "bayat," to his boss, but he refused to discuss the topic.

"I never talked to them about this issue," Hamdan told the judge through an Arabic interpreter. "I never pledged allegiance."

Judge Keith Allred, a Navy captain, is evaluating whether the interrogation is tainted by coercion and therefore inadmissible as evidence at the first American war crimes trial since World War II. He said he would issue a ruling by Thursday morning.

If the judge allows the jury to hear testimony of Naval Criminal Investigative Service agent Robert McFadden, it would contradict the defense lawyers' claim that Hamdan was merely a low-level bin Laden employee with no allegiance to al-Qaida.

More:
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/americas/AP/story/62369...

[raebrek]

12. I wonder if they thought

that they could follow him back to Bin Laden or if they turned him while he was there. Either way I would think he would be killed upon his return to work just in case.

Raebrek!!!