04/20/15 04/20/15 [captioning made possible by democracy now!] amy: from pacifica, this is democracy now! >> they trying to make me force this something to support terrorism. i said, the dude is not a [blee] terrorist. he's nothing but an oxymoron. amy: today, we look at an explosive new film that shines a

bright light on the fbi's shadowy use of informants in its controversial counterterrorism sting operations. you just heard the fbi informant saeed torres, aka sharif. this is his target. >> sharif left me alone in his truck. when he did that, there was a letter sitting on the dashboard from the law office. i snapped a picture of it because i knew he was fbi. i wanted to know who this guy was. his real name is saeed torres. amy: khalifah al-akili from a white muslim convert in pittsburgh, about to have a news conference with his lawyer saying he was being set up when he was arrested by the fbi. ultimately he was sentenced to eight years in jail on non-terrorism charges. today, we look at the film "(t)error" that is with a "t" with current the seas around it.

we take you on the journey of the fbi informant as well as -- all of that and more coming up. welcome to democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. hundreds of people are believed to be dead in what may be the deadliest migrant disaster ever in the mediterranean sea. as many as 700 people perished after the boat capsized after departing from libya. only 28 people were rescued. the warmer weather has increased the number of journeys by people fleeing to europe from violence and poverty in africa and the middle east. the latest tragedy comes after a spokesperson for the international organization for migration had already warned the mediterranean death toll has increased tenfold from about 90 last year to 900 this year. >> are talking about a death toll this year that is already 10 times what it was last year. and when you recall that we

reported the deaths in the mediterranean last year, if this trend were to continue, we would be talking about over 30,000. it is quite alarming. amy: european officials are holding urgent talks on the margaret talks -- migrant talks today. in iraq, an estimated 90,000 people have fled the province of anbar over a period of several days, as the city of ramadi appears to be on the verge of falling to the self-proclaimed islamic state. isil forces have seized towns around ramadi, which lies 60 miles west of baghdad. meanwhile in northern iraq , kurdish forces backed by u.s.-led airstrikes say they have made progress against isil around the city of kirkuk. isil has released video it says shows the executions of about 30 ethiopian christians in libya. the video shows one group of captives in orange jumpsuits being beheaded on a beach, while another group of captives is shot to death in a different libyan region.

iran's foreign minister has published an op-ed in "the new york times" caceasefire and dialogue to resolve the crisis in yemen. as u.s.-backed saudi airstrikes rock the capital sanaa, which is held by iranian-backed houthi rebels, mohammed javad zarif writes -- "one cannot confront al qaeda and its ideological siblings such as the so-called islamic state, in iraq, while effectively enabling their growth in yemen and syria." on iranian supreme leader sunday, ayatollah khamenei criticized u.s. foreign policy. cook's the myth of iranian nuclear weapons was created by the americans with europeans and others, with the purpose of showing iran as a threat. no, america itself is the threat. the american regime is the greatest threat to the world today with its irrelevant interference anywhere he pleases in the world, without any control, without any commitment religious, or moral. interference the compromises security.

amy: nuclear talks between iran and world powers resume tuesday. in somalia, the militant group al-shabab has killed nine people in a bomb attack on a van carrying workers to a united nations office in the region of puntland. the dead include four staff members from unicef. it was the third deadly attack by al-shabab on foreign personnel in three days, following earlier attacks on african union peacekeepers and a kenyan convoy. a new report by the intercept and der spiegel has revealed the u.s. military base in ramstein germany is the "high-tech heart" of the u.s. drone program. while u.s. and german officials have sought to downplay the base's role in the u.s. drone wars, documents obtained from an anonymous source show the base serves as a crucial relay station, sending signals from creech air force base in nevada to drones over yemen somalia , and other countries. fbi agents have arrested six people in minnesota and california as part of what they say is a terrorism investigation.

the fbi has provided no details about the arrests so far. the news comes after a 23-year-old ohio man was arraigned last week for allegedly traveling to syria to aid the al-qaeda-linked al-nusra front. prosecutors say abdirahman sheik mohamud boasted of his skills to a government informant, and planned to attack a military facility or prison within the united states. meanwhile, australian and british police meanwhile say they have arrested a number of teenagers, including a 14-year-old boy, in connection with an alleged plot to attack a war memorial ceremony in australia. the state department has acknowledged it reached out to corporate media executives for help countering narratives put forth by the self-proclaimed islamic state and by russia. an email published by wikileaks as part of a trove of hacked documents from sony shows state department official richard stengel telling sony entertainment ceo michael lynton that countering such narratives is "not something that the state department can do on its own,"

and suggest a meeting of media executives to "help us think about better ways to respond." state department spokesperson marie harf acknowledged the administration has talked with social media and entertainment organizations about its efforts against isil. >> we talk to a host of government and nongovernmental actions about the isil coalition. this is a very, very small target. i would not draw any big anytical statements from this, other than we are very clear that we believe people who have platforms who can speak out against isil should do so, but their content, what they choose to say and print, what they choose to make in terms of movies is obviously, entirely up to them. and i think sony would say the same thing. amy: other sony emails from the wikileaks trove reveal actor ben affleck asked the creators of the pbs documentary seri "finding your roots," to conceal the fact he had a slave-owning ancestor. the film's host, henry louis gates, consulted sony entertainment ceo michael lynton

for advice, and ultimately, the fact was left out of the film. gates and pbs say the omission was based on editorial grounds. tens of thousands of people marched ndndndaround the world saturday on a global day of action against a free trade deal being negotiated between the united states and europe. opponents of the transatlantic trade and investment partnership, or ttip, say it would threaten gmo restrictions undermine health, environmental and financial regulations by letting corporations sue countries in private trade tribunals over laws they claim threaten their profits. over 600 protests took place saturday against the ttip and other secretive free-trade deals, including the transpacific partnership or tpp which president obama has been , granted fast-track authority to negotiate with 11 countries in south america and asia. in finland, millionaire former telecommunications executive who advocates austerity policies has

won election as the next prime minister. juha sipilä will likely need to form a coalition government with the right-wing, anti-immigration finns party, which wants to expel greece from the european union. in mexico, a new investigation has revealed federal police massacred 16 civilians in january in the state of michoacan. authorities had described the incident in apatzingán as a shootout with a civil defense force, but a report in the outlets proceso, aristegui noticias and univision based on interviews with dozens of people reveals federal police attacked an encampment of members of the anti-cartel rural defense group, who had staged a sit-in after the federal security commissioner in the state dissolved their group without pay. the police reportedly yelled "kill them like dogs," as they descended on the protesters, none of whom fired a shot. hours later, the federal police opened fire on vehicles carrying civil defense members and their family members. a witness described seeing

someone killed while on his knees. >> they shouted at me, put your hands up get on your knees. when i want to put my hands up and get on my knees, a person further down toward -- a person he was on his knees, i saw how they shot him in the face and he fell. they shot him while he was on his knees surrendering unarmed. amy: in maryland, a 27-year-old african-american man has died one week after an arrest by baltimore police that left him in a coma. freddie gray's family and attorney say his voice box was crushed and his spine was "80% severed at his neck." police have not said why they arrested gray. video shot by a bystander shows him screaming in apparent pain as police drag him to a van. you can hear the bystander's voice. >> look at his [bleep] legs.

they look broke. how are you dragon him like that -- why are you dragging him like that? amy: amy: police say officers placed additional restraints on gray while he was the van, and half an hour later, called paramedics to take him to the hospital. gray died on sunday, amid protests demanding answers. his family has called for a federal probe. police in st. louis county missouri shot and killed a 23-year-old african-american man after his mother called them for help. police say thaddeus mccarroll emerged from his house with a knife and charged at them, after his mother reported he was behaving abnormally and talking about a "black revolution." audio from a police body camera shows mccarroll repeatedly asking the police to go, saying he was "pissed off because you guys won't leave me alone." police fired a rubber bullet then seconds later, opened fire with an automatic weapon. mccarroll's death comes as new information has emerged about the militarized response to mass protests over the police killing

of michael brown in nearby ferguson, missouri last year. documents obtained by cnn show the missouri national guard used the terms "enemy forces" and "adversaries" to refer to the protesters. in arizona, a police officer who ran a suspect over with his cruiser will not face charges. footage from a police dashboard camera shows marana police officer michael rapiejko running down a suspect police say was armed with a stolen gun. the suspect, mario valencia, was hospitalized but survived. , prosecutors say they lacked evidence to prove the officer had "the requisite criminal intent for aggravated assault." he is a former nypd officer who was previously sued for excessive force. the justice department has admitted almost every member of an fbi unit specializing in forensic hair samples who gave exaggerated testimony in nearly every case.

according to the "washington post," a review has found 26 out of 28 examiners overstated forensic matches in ways that favored prosecutors in more than 95% of trials examined so far. the trials took place over a 20-year period before 2000. they include 32 cases in which prisoners were sentenced to death, including 14 who were executed or died in prison. oklahoma has become the first u.s. state to approve the untested use of nitrogen gas for executions. a new law signed by the governor establishes s as a backup method if lethal and direction drugs are unavailable or if the method is blocked by a court. nitrogen gas works by depriving the body of oxygen. it is banned for use on animals in some states, and there's no record of it ever being used to execute humans. executions remain on hold in oklahoma as the supreme court considers its three drug lethal injection method following the botched execution of clayton

lockett, who took 43 minutes to die. the 61-year-old mailman who entered restricted airspace to land his gyrocopter on the capitol lawn in a protest calling for campaign finance reform says attention has focused too heavily on his methods, rather than his message. speaking after he returned home to florida, doug hughes said money in politics should be the real concern. >> we need to be worried not about whethereoeoeoeoneeoan fly into d.c., we need to be worried about the piles of money going into congress. >> do you consider yourself a patriot? >> know, i'm a mailman. amy: and dr. irwin schatz, who became a lone critic of the now-notorious tuskegee syphillis study years before it was exposed in the press, has died at the age of 83. for four decades until 1972, the u.s. government studied the long-term effects of untreated syphilis on poor, black men. after reading the study -- reading of the study a medical

journal in 1964, schatz wrote -- "i am utterly astounded by the fact that physicians allow patients with potentially fatal disease to remain untreated when effective therapy is available." but a study co-author dismissed his letter, saying it was the first of its kind they had received. schatz died of cancer at home in hawaii. and those are some of the headlines. this is democracy now! democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. today we look at an explosive new film that shines a bright light on the fbi's shadowy use of informants in its counter-terrorism sting operations. these undercover operatives are meant to root out would be terrorists before they attack. since 9/11 they have been used , to prosecute at least 158 people. but critics argue they are the often target the wrong people. a 2014 report by human rights watch found the fbi has focused on "particularly vulnerable people, including those with intellectual and mental disabilities, and the indigent."

well, a new documentary that just premiered here in new york at the tribeca film festival takes us inside the world of a particular informant who has played a key role in several major terrorism cases. and it does so while he is in the middle of carrying out his latest sting operation. it is called "(t)error," with the "t" in parenthesis, to put the emphasis on "error ." it came together when two independent filmmakers gained unprecedented access to follow saeed torres, aka "shariff," a 63-year-old former black revolutionary turned fbi informant, as he monitors a muslim convert named khalifah al-akili. torres knew one of the directors, lyric cabral, and after he came out to her as an informant, he agreed to share his story without informing his , superiors. in this clip from the film, the other director, david felix sutcliffe interviews "shariff" inside the fbi safe house in pittsburgh, pennsylvania, where the operation is underway.

>> how exactly do they train you? >> they don't train you for nothing. it's how i use the language. if they train me, i would never get what i want because they're strictly textbook. there's a difference between telling someone and making a suggestion. entrapment is if i go ahead and tell him, let's go rob a bank. and you know that was not his intention, it was my intention. so i am entrapping him. i don't make the suggestion. i may go and say damn, there's a lot of money in there, boy. look at all that damn money. he feeds into it in the goes,[bleep] i would like to take that. >> what about your current targets? >> a wait into we speak and get to know each other what we speak about. so when he brought up camping that was my key opening right there. the door opened up for me to

make a suggestion now. that is cool, man. we can go camping. i said, why don't we just go a little further? we could train like redoing the military. amy: amy: that is a clip from "(t)error," of saeed torres, aka "shariff" an fbi informant who portrays himself as a radicalized muslim in order to monitor khalifa al-akili. as the film unfolds, al-akili begins to post on his facebook page that he suspects the fbi is targeting him. the filmmakers used this an -- as an opportunity to approach him and soon find themselves interviewing him at the same time they are also documenting "shariff" monitoring him. during this time, each man remains unaware that the filmmakers are talking to the other one. well, to pick up the story from there, we are joined by the filmmakers who co-directed "(t)error," lyric cabral and david felix sutcliffe. in a minute, we also will get a call from prison from khalifa al-akili. as the film shows, he was

arrested just days after he emailed civil rights groups to say he believed he was the target of an fbi entrapment sting. he is now serving 8 years in federal prison for illegally possessing a gun after having previous felony convictions for selling drugs. he was not arrested on terrorism charges. we welcome you both to [captioning made possible by democracy now!] tell us about this story lyric how you discovered it. >> i met saeed torres his double life, if you will. i was studying photography living in a small brownstone in harlem. he was my neighbor. while he was my neighbor, i would have frequent visits to his apartment. we would engage in conversations about politics. one day, he abruptly disappeared. this was at the end of three years of conversing. it was may 28, 2005. i was wondering where he went when i got a call from him.

he said i'm no longer new york's. if someone asks about me, please give me a call. when i said, why? he said, i have relocated and i have something to tell you. when i went there, he confessed to me the apartment we had been conversing with an offense an fbi safe house. the rent was being paid for by the fbi. it was wired with audio and video surveillce. he said, do you remember tarik shah? he is in jail on suspicion of terrorism. when i met saeed torres, it was the height of his career. the domestic investigation into tarik shah and the other -- amy: a musician? >> yes, and the other was based in germany will stop amy: you did not know this at the time. >> know, i just knew he was a well-dressed man who said he worked for the legal aid. amy: this fbi informant said he

worked for legal aid? did he? >> the fbi took him from his job with the promise of doubling his pay. after the first world trade center attack. amy: was he working at legal aid and an fbi informant at the same time? >> i believe so. he always had some type of supplementary income. amy: he left. how did you reconnect with him anananand anat year was it that he left harlem? >> the left carmen -- harlem in 2005 after tarik shah's arrest. i went in june or july that summer to visit him in south carolina. it wasn't reconnecting. i knew the rest tremendous -- i knew there was tremendous information there. for about 10 years, i really called him once a month, how are you, where are you until david -- amy: explain how you came into the picture. >> lyric and i met about the same time in 2005 working in an

afterschool arts program in harlem. one of our students was arrested by the fbi, 16-year-old girl. that shocked everyone. watching what happened to her as a result of her arrest her father was deported, the government decided to -- amy: she was from -- >> west africa. she was 16 years old and had to be the primary caretaker. her mother did not have "or have work. i started to notice the other cap tourism terrorism does the other counterterrorism cases. creating plots and cultivate arrests the fbi could use to sweep in and testify of it treat in the war on terror. while observing these cases, i thought, dramatically, that would be a fascinating story. the relationships being set up between these two individuals target and informant, the

informant known this person is ultimately going to be arrested. amy: when he started talking to sharif, his aka name, saeed torres, for the film, you had not gotten in touch with khalifah al-akili, his target in pittsburgh? >> no. amy: lyric, let's talk about you convincing see -- saeed to go on camera. you are getting him in the middle of this thing. the fbi doesn't know about this? >> presumably, we as filmic or sought comment from the fbi and we have yet to hear comment. we presume -- [indiscernible] this film comes from his desire to tell the story and get it on record. amy: even as he is doing another's ring. -- another sting. >> it didn't entirely make sense to us either. why would this person agree to participate? we did not want to question that initially.

we said, let's take advantage of the opportunity. ultimately, at the height of his career saeed was making hundreds of thousands of dollars working on multiple investigations. in 2005 having to testify, his identity was exposed and everyone became aware he was actually an informant. at that point, he left new york and no longer had the social connections that made him a valuable asset to the fbi. when we met up with them several years later, he was barely getting reimbursed for gas money and was struggling to make those large paychecks he had been making previously in his career which i think is what prompted him to agree to participate in the film. amy: lyric, how did you get in touch with his target? visibly, he did not tell you who he was surveilling. amy:>> we sought legal consultation early on from the aclu who told

us our perimeters. saeed torres had a facebook profile. because it was public and he share that information with us we began to check it. increasingly, while we were documenting the investigation, khalifah al-akili began to articulate suspicions on his public facebook page. interesting status updates like, the feds must think i am -- he would start to articulate he thought he was the target of an fbi investigation. ultimately, his suspicions became more detailed and when he articulated a name saeed, the name of the man he thought was targeting him, we started reaching out to him. amy: when we come back from break, we will hear both from sharif and from khalifah al-akili in jail, sharif we have from the film "(t)errorstay with us.

♪ [music break]

amy: this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. sunday march the 20th anniversary of the oklahoma city bombing. that attack killed 168 people. we continue with the film "(t)error." that is "t" with parenthesis around it to emphasize terror. this is saeed torres, sharif

expressing that his handlers keep pushing him to help them pursue terrorism charges against this white muslim convert named khalifah al-akili. the filmmakers are interviewing sharif again at the fbi safe house in pittsburgh. >> i could set him up, just take a [bleep] and gun and say call in the locals and that the locals grabbed him right now. boom, he got a gun. and it's all over with him. they don't want to do it that way. and i said, i'm not here to entrap nobody. they trying to make me force this dude into saying something to support terrorism. i said, to do it is not a -- the dude is not a [bleep] terrorist am a man. he is not even a pseudo terrorist. he is nothing but at oxymoron. what you been doing for the last three years, god and see nothing ? what do you expect me to see? amy: that is the fbi informant

sharif. this is a clip from the film [bleep] "(t)error" when he discovers saeed torres and mohammed were fbi informants. >> sharif loan in his truck. when he did that there's a letter sitting on the dashboard from the welfare office. so i picked it up and i snapped a picture of it. i knew he was fbi. i wanted to know who this guy was. israel name is saeed torres. -- his real name is saeed torres . >> come on, shiva. >> this was a guy who used to e-mail me all the time. call me, let's go all for coffee -- let's go out for coffee. a lot of that slow down dramatically after he introduced me to this "mohammed."

i looked up his phone number on google. >> [indiscernible] >> that's him. >> mohammed. he was informant for the fbi. amy: so there is khalifah al-akili understanding who he has been talking to. we're in the studio with lyric cabral, independent document or a filmmaker who codirected the documentary "(t)error" with david felix sector. we're joined in washington, d.c. by stephen downes executive , director of the national coalition to protect civil freedoms. he works with project salam, which published a report last year called "inventing terrorists: the lawfare of

pre-emptive prosecution." he is also representing imprisoned pakistani scientist dr. aafia siddiqui. we will talk about that in a moment. stephen downes, we're at the point where khalifah al-akili realizes he is being set up by the fbi. he somehow reaches out to you. explain. >> he sent us a letter to the national coalition. we decided to respond to this because he had refutable proof he was being stopped by the fbi and did not want to participate in any kind of terrorist plot. what we decided to do, we called him -- we wanted to make sure he had legal representation, that he was aware of his rights. we also decided to hold a press conference in washington to call attention to this and announce the fbi and saying, you should not be stalking people who don't want to be entrapped.

amy: you are going to hold a news conference. did you think at this point that he was close to arrest? >> yes. i would have said, because we have had experience with -- up in albany, the main informant that entrapped a local imam that we were on the defense team for him. we knew him well. he was sort of brought in as the closer. we assumed he was getting close to doing something. amy: what you mean, you knew shihid well? >> he was an informant the fbi sent in to convict, essentially take down an imam in a mosque in albany. kathy and i were on the defense team. we represented araf so we knew shihid well because he testified at the trial -- or he was part of the trial. his tape recordings of all of

the meetings with araf -- who was completely innocent, i believe, or put into evidence. it was from that fake arrest of araf that we started our analysis of preemptive prosecution and ultimately setup project salam. amy: what is so astounding about this film, you are filming it not in retrospect, people regrading the story, but as it is happening -- both sides -- they don't know you are interviewing each other, david and lyric. now you come to the point, the possibility of arrest. how are you there in his early morning hours when khalifah al-akili was arrested? >> it was a coincidence. we were on our way to film him going to morning prayer. we knew there was a possibility of him being arrested soon, so we wanted to film with them as much as possible. we wanted to capturing going to the mosque in the early morning. previously, sharif would offer him rights to the mosque. sharif lived half a block down the street from khalifah al-akili, which was an

intentional decision on the fbi to get him as close as possible. it is a tactic they use frequently. oh, you're going to the mosque? i cannot for your right. we pull up in our car and seat suvs outside the front of khalifah al-akili plus apartment and grabbed a camera jumped out and started filming. amy: this is a clip from "(t)error" when khalifah al-akili is arrested. >> i haven't done anything to anybody. mohammed said, beware of the supplication of the person who was unjustly treated. this is wrong. i haven't done anything to anyone. can you get a hold of someone to help my wife please?

>> now investigators are questioning a man after the fbi raided his home. what they found inside has forced them to launch a major investigation. >> he told friends he wanted to join the taliban and i like a martyr. but he ran from the a ei. the pittsburgh fbi swat team took him down moments later in front of his apartment. now the feds tonight looking to see just what level of anti-american he might be. >> khalifah al-akili also known as james marvin thomas, junior was in possession of jihadist literature and military literature and tactics and that he promoted guerrilla violence against the u.s. armed forces. >> tonight, there's no hard evidence, according to the feds that the suspect took any action against the united states, but this investigation of the

suspect and his friends is far from over. amy: that report from pittsburgh. steve downs, khalifah al-akili contacted you right before that arrest. now explain as we hear about fbi stings and arrests now, just in our headlines today, around the country, explain ultimately what he was convicted of. >> well, he was convicted -- the fbi, when they go after some of you like this, we call it preemptive prosecution. they look for anything they can get to take a person down if they are suspicious about his motivations or if there's something they think he might do in the future. so they apparently went through his records very closely, as they do in a lot of cases, and found he had a prior drug arrest -- felony drug arrest. a number of years ago, which would prohibit him from owning or possessing any guns. any firearms.

on his facebook page, he had posted a picture of himself holding a gun which a friend had given him in a public shooting range. he was simply holding the gun. obviously, he did not think of that as possessing a gun. it was a gun at a been rented at the public shooting range. under the law, that his possession. they knew they had this fallback position. if they could not entrap him into a terrorist activity, then they would get him for the gun charge. and that is what they ultimately did. they arrested him, really, the day before the press conference. i had art he sent him a bus ticket to come down to washington for the press conference. i think the fbi was reading our e-mails and knew it would happen and decided to abandon the attempt to get him on terrorism charges. and just do him on the old gun charge. amy: he didn't actually go to trial, right? >> he pled, eventually, yes. amy: because? >> it is very hard to win these

cases. the case law is pretty clear. if you hold a gun when you're not supposed to possess a gun, that would be sufficient to convict you. by getting a plea bargain, he was able to reduce the sentence considerably to a believe eight years. amy: the significance of this, as you cover this case, lyric and david. he pleads guilty. he ends up going to jail. we were just about to bring you a live interview with khalifah al-akili. we had the time set. he was calling us from the new jersey prison where he is being held. but he just called and said he was brought to the security office this morning and told he could not make a call that would be broadcast live with us. but he did do an interview from prison sunday night with democracy now! producer renée feltz. khalifah al-akili is the muslim

american from the pittsburgh area who was arrested just days after he emailed civil rights groups to say he believed he was the target of an fbi "entrapment" sting. his story is told in the new film, "(t)error." he is now serving 8 years in federal prison for illegally possessing a gun. the interview with khalifa al-akili was conducted over the phone, so listen closely. >> a name is khalifah al-akili and i am in prison. i've been your over two years, going -- a little over two years. >> we're talking about the film "(t)error" in which you describe how the fbi targeted you. can you talk about how you came to understand you are being targeted by the fbi? >> i knew as early as 2005 i was targeted the fbi when i'm at this one individual in my community, the local muslim community. he walked up to me in the mosque began talking some radical views.

strange things. immediately, i felt and comfortable and i expressed my discomfort to other people in the community that also had that same discomfort regarding this individual. this was as early as 2005. in regards to the recent events with saeed torres and sahid hussein, i became aware almost after i met saeed torres this guy had an agenda with his wanted to spark up her relationship with me, that he moved mysteriously down the street from me. i knew immediately this guy had an agenda. >> you were ultimately convicted based on the help from the informant who went by sharif, but not on terrorism charges. your convicted on terrorism charges and you pled guilty to those charges. can you talk a little bit about how that unfolded and why you pled guilty? >> basically, after i came

forward and sent out the e-mail exposing the two informants in my desire to go to washington, d.c., press conference was established and set up by the national coalition to protect civil freedoms, are supposed to attend that. the day before i was arrested coming out of my home early morning getting ready to go to the mosque to attend morning prayers. i was charged with a weapons violation based on a picture of me from two years prior to me and some friends went to a gun range. it was pretty much had nothing to do with the informant directly. and this was done, i believe and a timely manner in order to stop me from attending the press conference. i eventually ended up taking a plea due to the fact the threat of facing more time and pretty much knowing when you're up against the federal government there's really nothing -- very limited resources of being able to seek some type of justice when the chips are stacked against you. i took a plea in order to get

less time than what i was facing. renée: can you talk about the impact this case and the charges against you have had on your wife and on your family? she is the deported, is that right? >> not deported, but under the threat of being arrested, my wife i'll internally laughed. this has definitely had a devastating effect on my family regards to physically separating. not only by my incarceration, but the fact in 2013, immigration authorities approached my family in columbus, ohio and under the threat of my wife being told if she doesn't leave she would be incarcerated saying her application was denied, and every thing in regards to how my wife originally enter this country was legal, and they found a small technicality to find a reason that she overstayed her original 90 days when she entered the country from the u.k. as a visitor, even

though we file the paperwork within that timeframe. for her to get permanent residency and eventually to get citizenship. but they used that in order to basically threaten her and tell her she has to leave, that her application was denied. and that happened in 2013. my wife is now living in london with her uncle. in regards to being separated and not being able to receive visits, phone calls are extremely expensive. one dollar per minute for international calls. it is hard for me to keep in touch with my same -- with my family. it has caused a strain. amy: that is khalifah al-akili during a phone interview from new jersey, southern jersey. he ended his interview saying if there some sort of legitimate threat, than i have no problem supporting the government and doing what they need to do and to protect fellow americans. we will post the full interview on our website at democracynow.org. we had hoped to conduct the interview live today with khalifah al-akili.

he called up to say the security office said he could not do a live interview. so we recorded this interview yesterday and played to a portion. we will post the rest online at democracynow.org as he described what happened to his family, his wife and baby. lyric cabral, the deportation of his wife? >> yes after his arrest, he was kicked out of public housing. he and his wife and his daughter were kicked out of public housing. they sort of depended on the charity of friends locally in pittsburgh, and ultimately, moved to ohio. we travel to ohio to film with her to do a little bit of follow-up. when we went there, we found immigration had seized her passport along with the passport of for daughter. basically, told her she could not get these documents back unless you left the country. under the threat of being arrested, she was sort of forcibly made to leave. amy: lyric cabral and david felix sutcliffe are the directors of remarkable real-time film called "(t)error ."

it was first shown at sundance and it -- this week in, shown at the tribeca film festival. it was shown to a packed house. people stunned at the end of this film. when we come back, we are going to continue to talk about this fbi sting. actually, a well-known jazz musician named tarik shah. we are joined by tarik shah's mother as well. stay with us. ♪ [music break]

amy: this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. today we are talking about a new film called, "(t)error" about the fbi informant and his targets. we talked about the case of khalifah al-akili, who is now in prison for eight years on non-terrorism-related charges. he was afraid if he went to

trial, who knew what would happen. he pled out and he is in prison in new jersey for eight years. now we're going to go to a previous target of this fbi informant named sharif. it was actually saeed torres. our guests are lyric cabral and david felix sutcliffe, both directors of "(t)error" and steve downs who's an attorney who deals with issues like this come and we are joined by the mother of the man named tarik shah, who was arrested in 2005 after a joint fbi/nypd sting operation that involved saeed torres, who he thought was his friend, but was actually an fbi informant. torres is featured in the new film "(t)error." ,lyric cabral, let's go back to tarik shah. >> tarik shah was a prominent or is a prone it jazz musician --

prominent jazz musician. tarik shah frugally played at the lenox lounge at a saint nicholas pub. the fbi knew he frequented the neighborhood. they introduced tarik to saeed and toldsaedd to get an apartment in harlem, where i live, to target tarik shah. so he would have a location to hang out before and after gigs engaging in conversation. during these conversations -- tarik was facing child support issues. saeed knew this and would offer him money and basically go to him and say, i know you have these child support issues. at the time, he -- tarik was unable to travel to europe. amy: why? >> the government had taken away his passport because he owed child support. they also took away his driver's license. here's a musician literally unable to travel g to get to hisigs except on foot and the

charity of others. saeed said, i know how you can make money. tarik is a martial arts expert. he had been trained. his father was one of malcolm x's lieutenants. partly this is a family who has been under surveillance since the 1960's. -- obviously, this is a family who has been under surveillance is a 1960's. amy: they were neighbors? >> tarik did not live in the brownstone, but he would stop by a lot because he frequently played in harlem. he would have a place late at night after he would get off a gig. saeed torres use the child support need thatt arik had going about $70,000 and said, if you use your martial art service in service of "al qaeda" i can get your passport back and get you the money. amy: steve downs explained

ultimately, what happened to tarik, what he was charged with. >> he was charged with natural support for terrorism for essentially, i suppose, nothing more than a scripted plot does not a scripted plot, but scripted play by the fbi. he took sort of an oath to al qaeda that he would treat al qaeda soldiers as if they were injured somehow or would train them in martial arts. i think the request was, would you train al qaeda soldiers? and he said, i'll train anybody. i'm a martial arts instructor. and that was essentially for what he was convicted of. amy: marlene is the mother of tarik shah. you are close to malcolm x. you're one of the last people to speak to him on the telephone the day he was killed in 1965. >> that's right. amy: what happened to your son?

>> i think what happened withtarik, he is always befriended a lot of people. he used to always say, you know, if someone needed his help, he would give it to them. he spoke with me about teaching this particular person, saeed music lessons. and also that his wife was pregnant and he needed another place to stay -- which was in my brownstone. i had an apartment downstairs. tarik was redoing the apartment so he could basically stay there. also he was speaking to me about martial arts. he said saeed told him he could help him get his passport back -- amy: did he tell he worked for the fbi? >> no, he told him he was a paralegal. amy: with the working at legal

aid at the time? >> i don't know. he also told him he could help him with his child support. the child support was definitely drowning tarik. when he was working abroad, there was no problem. because working in europe and traveling abroad, i mean, you know, he made an abundance of money. in new york, he was not able to make the kind of money. so he would call me and say they took my passport, and then they took his drivers license. so i said, well, you're going to have to go -- amy: all to do a child support. >> all to do with child support. yet absolutely no way of traveling back and forth. he got people to take him. i said, you have to go to the motor bureau and asked for a driver's just use for work. lots of times if they take your license -- amy: nid. >> he did that, but basically,

he could not travel out of state. amy: versus very convenient guy saeed, nice guy, taking music lessons from tarik shah, saying i can help you and give you a little money. amy:>> right. tarik said, i'm interested in opening a new studio. when he moved into my house in the brownstone, he asked if he could do the basement, make a sound proof, to teach music, and also to do martial arts. i told him sure will stop if he could do that. in the interim, he was dealing with saeed and he told her about something on the island. from what i can understand, it wasn't suitable to his taste but he kept saying, you can make extra money teaching martial arts. you know, if you want -- i did not -- tarik never spoke to me about doing anything with al qaeda. you just said, mommy, i want to

open up another studio. and he said, i have a guy that will help me. now saeed had told him the studio that he had or this place he had on york island, he used to teach dance. he was a choreographer. so tarik will attempt to look at the place, figuring it would be suitable. you said when he got there, it wasn't suitable. for him there on and i don't know what happened in the interim with that. amy: how many years was he sentenced to? >> 15. amy: when does he get out? >> 2018. amy: does he feel like he was set up? >> of course, he knows he was. amy: what is the definition of entrapment in a sting operation like this, whether we're talking about tarik shah or khalifah al-akili? >> we have to face the reality that although there's technically an entrapment defense, a really no longer exists. i should say most western

countries, particularly in europe, do not permit entrapment by the government. it is obvious that the government should not be in the business of creating crimes for their own citizens. they should be protecting their citizens. in the united states, there is case law that set up entrapment defense early on. but over the years, an exception was created for anybody who is predisposed -- that would be, particularly in drug cases, if you had prior drug arrest or prior drug convictions, that should be used to show you were predisposed to commit this kind of crime, the government could then go in and do an entrapment in the sense of a buy or sell arrangement. that kind of case all went on for a while. then it was expanded to say what does it really mean to be predisposed? the supreme court created another exception by saying, well, predisposed also would include a ready response by the government. in other words, even if you

never have been involved in anything before, if the government offered you something that was illegal and you immediately accepted it or enthusiastically accepted it that would be a ready response, which would indicate you are predisposed. that ready response exception has grown under the war on terror into an exception that is so big, it is completely swallowed up the rule. the really is no entrapment defense anymore because anybody -- the only way you can escape from the ready response doctrine is to withdraw from the plot. if you withdraw from the plot there's no crime so there's nothing to charge. if you go through with the plot, then they will say, well, that was a ready response. the courts have tended to uphold that. my sense of it is right now, although the law is still a little influx, the entrapment defense really doesn't exist in the united states anymore. it is more a theory than in

practice. amy: i want to end by going to a slightly different issue, steve downs, talking about aafia siddiqui in pakistan, considered a political prisoner but in the united states, she is down his lady al qaeda. she's grilli incarcerated in federal prison in fort worth texas, where she's serving 86 years behind bars. you just know that her family. you just came back from pakistan and agreed to represent her. we will announce this today at a news conference. what are you going to say? we only have a minute, but just to get a taste of what this case is and what your defense is. >> i would say there are two points automate. first in pakistan, she is very very popular. everybody knows her. she is the daughter of the nation. the prime minister and his whole cabinet candor the family's house to pledge they will try to get her back. whereas here in america, she is almost unknown. i wanted to talk about that

because i think america, who holds a lot of the political prisoners in the world, does not do enough to publicize what political prisoners are and the conditions under which they are held. i think aafia siddiqui's case is a glaring example of this. the other thing that is for disturbing to us is she has not been heard from for over a year by her family. they've had counselor visits and the counselor has not even seen her face. there are concerns as to whether she is even alive. and if she is alive, what the state of her health is. one of the things i'm asking of the press conference, with the pakistani government to send a letter to the american government asking for an independent medical evaluation. to make sure she is alive and in good health. amy: we have to wrap, but we will continue this interview. >> pakistan where she really belongs. amy: thank you for being with us. we will continue this interview to expand her case and posted online at democracynow.org. steve downs, lyric cabral and

thank you so much for being with us. their film is "(t)error." marlene, thank you for being with us, mother of tarik shah. ccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccc