Calif. man indicted on terror charges

SACRAMENTO -- A federal grand jury indicted a 23-year-old man yesterday on charges that he materially supported terrorism against the United States by attending a training camp in Pakistan in 2003 and 2004.

Announced in Sacramento by US Attorney McGregor W. Scott, the indictment marked the first formal terrorism charge to come out of what Scott and other federal officials have characterized as a wide-ranging investigation into terrorism activities centered in the area around the central California city of Lodi, north of Stockton and east of San Francisco. Lodi has a large Pakistani Muslim population.

The content of the indictment for Hamid Hayat is nearly identical to charges alleging that Hayat and his father, Umer Hayat, 47, a Lodi ice cream truck driver, had initially lied to FBI agents about the younger Hayat's alleged training camp experiences. The US case against the Hayats is based on allegedly contradictory statements they made to the agents after they were detained in late May.

''The underlying allegations are really just the same, but relabeled," said Wazhma Mojaddidi, who represents Hamid Hayat. ''The government has been investigating my client since 2002. You would think that by this time they would be able to prove that he actually attended a terrorist camp. They haven't."

Wazhma and Johnny L. Griffin III, a lawyer who represents the father, said their clients were subjected to several days of long interrogations, largely in English, a language that neither man understands well, in late May and early June.

In addition to the Hayats, two Lodi Muslim imams -- both Pakistani citizens admitted into the United States on religious worker visas -- have been deported on allegations of immigration violations.

Imam Shabbir Ahmed, who initially contested the immigration charges, was deported Wednesday night, according to his lawyer, Saad Ahmad.

At hearings this summer in a San Francisco immigration court, Ahmed acknowledged having delivered anti-American sermons at his mosque in Islamabad, Pakistan, following the US invasion of Afghanistan in October 2001.

Another Lodi imam, Muhammad Adil Khan, was deported last month on charges that he had overstayed his religious worker's visa. Khan's son, covered under the same visa, also was deported.