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Tuesday, Nov 10, 2009
U.S. authorities apply different labels to crimes committed by two extremists -- one Muslim, the other Jewish.
Apr 17, 2003 | On Independence Day last summer, a depressed 41-year-old Muslim immigrant by the name of Hesham Mohamed Hadayet, whose views on the Arab-Israeli conflict had become increasingly extreme, approached the ticket counter of the Israeli-run El Al airline at Los Angeles International Airport. Loaded down with a recently purchased .45-caliber semiautomatic Glock pistol, a 9 mm handgun and a 6-inch knife, he opened fire. During a 30-second rampage, Hadayet emptied the 10-round revolver, killing two people and injuring scores more, before an El Al security guard shot him dead.
Six weeks later, in Tampa, Fla., a depressed Jewish podiatrist by the name of Dr. Robert Goldstein, 38, who wanted to send a message on behalf of "his people" following the attacks of Sept. 11, and to express his anger over the continuing Arab-Israeli conflict, was arrested after police raided his home. There they discovered a detailed plan to blow up 50 local mosques and Islamic centers, "kill all 'rags'" and "liquidate" Muslims during the attacks if necessary. Police also uncovered a vast illegal stash of weapons, including 30 explosive devices, light-armor rockets, hand grenades, a 5-gallon gasoline bomb, .50-caliber machine guns, silencers, and sniper rifles.
Ultimately, law enforcement authorities would label one man a terrorist, and the other a dangerous but deluded perpetrator of hate crimes. How do two crimes with similarities that seem highly relevant in the midst of a war on terrorism come to be defined so differently? Some observers cite paranoia in the wake of Sept. 11 as the reason. Others don't. But even some law enforcement officials are stymied by the choices made by their colleagues in the two cases.
Prosecutors working independently in the Hadayet and Goldstein cases concluded, after extensive criminal investigations, that both men were essentially unstable lone wolves without ties to any larger political or extremist organizations. Earlier this month, prosecutors in Florida, after consulting with Department of Justice attorneys, reached a plea agreement in the Goldstein case that reflected, apparently, this conclusion: He was convicted of weapons charges, attempting to damage religious property, and violating civil rights. His crime was not defined as a terrorist act.
But last week, after initially angering critics by downplaying the possibility of terrorism in the Hadayet case, the FBI confirmed that it had categorized the LAX shooting as a terrorist act. The final determination, according to Laura Bosley, spokeswoman for the FBI's Los Angeles office, was made in Washington by FBI Director Bill Mueller and Attorney General John Ashcroft.
The handling of the two cases, and above all their conclusions, raised the concerns of Muslim and Arab leaders who have suggested that, since Sept. 11, a double standard has emerged in cases that might be construed as acts of terror. They believe that defendants with a Middle Eastern background are far more likely to be labeled terrorists.
"There's a political will to charge terrorism on certain cases and not on others," says Khurrum Wahid, a criminal defense attorney and legal advisor to CAIR, the nation's largest Arab-American advocacy group. "And it's being used against anyone that's consistent with who we're going after for the 9/11 attacks."
The obvious difference between the two cases is that Goldstein was apprehended before he killed anyone, and Hadayet was not. From a prosecutorial perspective, there was another key difference: Hadayet acted alone, while Goldstein conspired with two others -- his wife, Kristi Goldstein, and his friend, Michael Hardee -- in creating plans to carry out attacks on Muslims mosques, attacks that reportedly were to include placing napalm under a dirt road near the targeted building in order to keep policemen at bay following the attacks. Both Kristi Goldstein and Hardee pleaded guilty to lesser charges in exchange for their cooperation in prosecuting Robert Goldstein.
"If Goldstein had a different background, that group would have been categorized as a terrorist cell," says Wahid. "They were working in collusion, targeting a specific group, and hoping to express political views with an action of planned violence. If they'd been Muslim you'd be hard-pressed to suggest that they wouldn't have been treated as a terrorism case." Instead, complains Wahid, the police treated it as a mental health issue since Goldstein had a history of depression.
"We felt that, based on evidence, we filed the proper charges," says Steve Cole, spokesman for the U.S. District Attorney's office in Tampa. He notes that Goldstein could be sentenced to 15 years in federal prison. "That's not a slap on the wrist. It's a significant amount of time." (In an unusual move, if the judge decides to sentence Goldstein to more than 15 years, the defendant will be allowed to withdraw his plea.)
