In a bid to seek bail, Mumbai terror attack terror suspect Tahawwur Rana on Thursday told a Chicago court that his escape from the United States will only force him to live as an 'international fugitive' and his knowledge of immigration business will not help him run from a 'federal indictment'.
Charged with conspiring to provide material support to terrorists in India, Rana filed in the US District Court his 7-page reply to the government's response to the motion made by him in December, seeking the revocation of his detention order.
Pakistani-Canadian citizen Rana will appear before a local court on January 25 for his arraignment. Federal prosecutors, who have been opposing his bail plea, have said Rana's incentive to flee has been 'heightened' by the maximum term of life imprisonment he now faces if convicted. Through his lawyer Patrick Blegen, Rana replied that any increased incentive for him to flee from a term of life as opposed to a term of 30 years is negligible.
"Defendant is 49 years old and a sentence of 30 years is tantamount to life imprisonment. Moreover, defendant would be forced to abandon his family, forfeit the property of his friends and family and live the rest of his life as an international fugitive. This option is surely no more attractive given the increase in his maximum sentence from a term of 30-year imprisonment to a term of life," Blegen said in the reply.
Rana's family has said it will post a million dollar bond to secure his release. Responding to the government's position -- that Rana could use his extensive international contacts and immigration expertise to flee the country -- Blegen said, "Such a suggestion ignores the clear difference between experience assisting foreign nationals in legally emigrating to the United States and running from a federal indictment. Defendant's immigration business revolves around immigration forms and dealings with foreign consulate, not clandestine travel and document forgery. It is unclear how defendant's knowledge of the requirements for legally entering the United States would aid him in an international manhunt".
It said the opinion of Judge Nan Nolan, who declined to grant him bail, is based on a "flawed interpretation of the facts of the case and a misunderstanding of defendant's business knowledge and financial means". The government does not address this and chooses instead to 'invoke Al Qaeda' as well as make the suggestion, without evidentiary support, that Rana would be able to flee with the support of international terrorists, the reply said.
It further said the government 'crafted a theory' that Rana knew about the attacks in Mumbai and congratulated the attackers on a job well done on the basis of recordings of conversation between him and co-accused David Coleman Headley.
Portions of these recordings are "unintelligible and contain only snippets of the conversation. Such a tortured reading of the evidence should clearly not weigh in favour of detention, when a cursory examination of the evidence illustrates that the evidence is not nearly as strong as the government suggests," Blegen said.
In a motion filed in late December, Rana had said he will not flee the country since he is a Pakistani army deserter and any attempt to flee to Pakistan would be met with incarceration and court martial proceedings.
The government had filed its opposition to the motion on January 15, a day after Rana was indicted, saying his acquaintances among members of terrorist organisations may provide him financial assistance if he fled from the country.
