Standing Up for Rezwan

PRESENTING REZWAN:

I like to present Rezwan by using the quote from the father of nonviolence movement Mahatma Gandhi. This is the quote Rezwan used in his 2003, Ashland, MA, High School senior yearbook, two years after the epic tragedy of 9/11. The quote is

“I offer you peace. I offer you love. I offer you friendship. I see your beauty. I hear your need.”

This quote describes Rezwan and his feelings towards humanity very well.

I can visualize the moment, he submitted this Mahatma Gandhi’s quote to his High School senior yearbook. He must have had his trademark smile on with his big brown eyes dancing. In these tragic times, every time that I remember Rezwan, which is my every conscious moment, I remember the day when we brought him home for the first time from hospital, five days old. I put his baby carriage down, Rezwan inside, in the middle of the living room in our small apartment in Natick, MA. His 15 months old brother was running around with excitement and his mother was sitting on the sofa with a radiant glow in her face. I bent over to Rezwan’s carriage, and he gave me the most beautiful smile with his big brown eyes dancing, as if to say, I am home and I am safe with my family. Since his arrest, on September 28, 2011, this is the picture, in my mind, that gave me strength and courage every day to go on. It also gives me the most pain, because I could not protect him when he was vulnerable from mental illness and needed the protection from the most unsuspecting predator, our own FBI, bent on manufacturing terrorism, using Muslim Americans.

Your Honor, Rezwan grew up in a multi-cultural, multi-religious, and multi-lingual family. I am a Muslim American. I came to US in 1975 from Bangladesh to go to college in Boston’s Northeastern University. Rezwan’s mother is a Catholic, an immigrant born in Cape Verde and raised in Angola, who came to US in 1974. My mother’s tongue is Bengali, while my wife’s mother tongue is Portuguese. We met in Northeastern University campus in 1979 while she was attending then Boston State College. Two cultures and two religions met under the umbrella of love and we got married in July of 1980. Let just say that it was not the norm of the day for our both cultures and both religions.

Our house was a true American Melting Pot. We raised Rezwan and his brother Farhad as Muslim and speaking only English. We celebrated Muslim religious holidays, like fasting month of ‘Ramadan’ and festival of ‘Eid’, and as well as Christmas and Thanksgiving. Rezwan could not wait to go to his Nana’s (my wife’s mother) house on Christmas Eve. It was a tradition. As far as I remember, we have never missed it until his Nana passed away in July of 2003 and even after that, we continued to visit her house on Christmas Eve. Everybody still talks about the eulogy Rezwan gave in the Church after his Nana’s death, 2 years after the 9/11. Rezwan and his brother received lots of toys at the stroke of midnight, when Christmas arrived. I do not remember Rezwan ever receiving neither a toy plane nor a toy gun, as gifts, in his entire life. Do you know why? He never liked toy plane or toy gun and everybody in his extended family knew about it. He was a great fan of train sets and Lego’s. In his younger days, most of his birthday cake used to have the picture of train engine on it. I remember on Christmas Eve 2006, more than 5 years after 9/11, family and friends gathered in his Nana’s house again and Rezwan entertained the guests with his solo drum performance while everybody danced along. You may ask what is the purpose of all these bragging about Rezwan? The purpose is not to brag but to emphasize that even more than 5 years after 9/11 tragedy, Rezwan was not an Islamic radical rather a Muslim American who loved to coexist with the other religions.  

Your Honor, Rezwan was the most non-confrontational and friendly person both outside and inside the house. He consciously avoided confrontation. We had never received any complain from outside about Rezwan. His school report card always mentioned what a pleasure to have him in the class. On Friday and Saturday nights, our house was always full of his and his brother’s friends, boys and girls. On the day of Rezwan and Farhad’s Junior Prom, our house was the staging point for 12 couples. Rezwan and Farhad arranged for everything and all the twelve couples and their parents and family came to our house in the afternoon before they left for the Prom and came back to our house, after the Prom was over.

Your Honor, Rezwan was also the most responsible son parents can wish for.  Until the last semester of his junior year at Northeastern University, January 2007, we never had to worry about his sense of responsibility. He always knew what was his primary responsibility was. I remember his school days until his high school graduation in Ashland, if whatever reason, Rezwan did not do his homework night before, he will wake up early in the morning and finish his homework before going to school. This happened a lot, because, he was not only an Advanced Placement (AP) student, he used to have a tremendous amount of extra curricular activities like math club, playing soccer, playing in bands, participating in robotic competition with his friends, and doing charity works along with his mother.

Your Honor, talking about Rezwan will never be complete if I do not talk about his love for music and playing the Drums in the band. It is his love for playing Drums really defines his character in the pre/post 9/11 era. He fell in love with playing Drums very early in his life and it was his constant companion until the starting of his senior year at Northeastern University, September 2007. Rezwan was a permanent fixture, as a drummer in his Middle School, Junior High, and High School musical group. In Ashland High senior class, he was voted, most musical. During Junior High and High School years, his band groups mostly practiced in the basement of our house. Even when he was attending Northeastern University (2003 – 2008), he was the founder drummer of the group ‘Goosepimp’ and every Friday they came back to Ashland, in our house, and practice band for hours in our basement. The whole house shook but his mother and I tolerated this. Point of all these is to underline that Rezwan was no loner, rather a quite popular young man to the extent that many times his mother and I had to remind him to slow down.

Rezwan started attending Northeastern University on September of 2003. He was a Bunche Scholar in Northeastern University, which awarded to approximately 30 students out of about 3000 freshmen every year. This is the highest academic award given by the Northeastern University to any freshman. This award provides the student with free tuition, room, and board for four academic years. First three years of college, he lived in the dorm, did things most college students do, with the exception of occupying himself with playing drums in the band, may be, a bit too much for a Physics student. His mother and I were a little concerned, when we expressed our feeling to him, he assured us not to worry and his grade supported his claim. By the end of 2006, Rezwan had about two semesters of course work left before his graduation. Winter semester of 2007, Rezwan was suppose to be in Co-Op, but decided to take a break and stay home instead for the whole semester. We did not think anything wrong to take a little break and reset himself from his hectic schedule that he maintained, specially, knowing that he has less than two semesters worth of course work left and should be able to graduate easily with his class of 2008. Suddenly, out of the blue, there was this scary incident involving Rezwan, happened sometime during the first week of January 2007, which got us shaken and for the first time we started questioning his sense of responsibility and be able to take care of himself. On that day, he took his mother’s car and went to Boston around midday saying that he would be back by evening, but when he did not come back by midnight, we became very worried and called his cell phone several times but he did not answer. We called one of his college friends that we know, who also plays bands with him. His friend said something like seeing him at day but did not know his whereabouts now. We anxiously waited until almost 6:00AM in the next morning, when he showed up, visibly shaking and scared to the point of hallucinating. He said when he was driving back home, he saw all these figures following him, some kind of paranormal stuff and he was very scared. I immediately checked his mother’s car for any sign of damage and found none. We hugged him, put him in our bed between his mother and me, and tried to comfort him. We asked him repeatedly, where he was at night or if he has taken anything. Finally, he said he was in Roxbury with ‘drum circle’ doing some community work and somebody gave him something to eat. This was totally an unknown territory for us with Rezwan. We were very scared too. We let him come down and sleep between us. Later that day, he did give me the name of the person and told me that the person was a community activist. He came to know this person through ‘drum circle’ sometime in the fall of 2006. Later, we found out this person was at least 11 years older than Rezwan and he was frequently sponsoring this person in the dorm cafeteria for meals. Rezwan promised us that he would be very careful in the future and stay away from this person. We wanted him to see a Psychologist but he said there was no need for one.  Later, we found out, while he was staying home during the winter semester of 2007, he did go to see a Psychologist couple of times.

START OF REZWAN’S DEPRESSION:

Your Honor, the next time I saw Rezwan, it was about three weeks later, on a Sunday. In the meantime, both his mother and I had talked to him on the telephone few times. Once or twice, he did not answer our phone calls couple of days. He told us that he has started a part time job with a Japanese Bakery driving a Van to deliver foods to many Boston and Cambridge restaurants and doing private tutoring also. He went to the Bakery at 6:00AM in the morning, by taking Boston Subway and came back around 3:00 PM, and was attending classes in the evening too. We were concerned that he was burning himself out, and suggested, may be he should stop working in the Bakery. We were paying for his expenses for staying in the roomy house anyway. His answer was he should be able to pay for his expenses. When I went to see him on a Sunday for the first time, after we came back from California, a few days after the Muslim fasting month of ‘Ramadan’ had started around September 13th,  as usual his mother had cooked food for him, I found a totally different Rezwan than I knew. It seemed to me that he had lost weight, very quite, and speaking very softly only when I ask something. He told me that he was fasting (sunrise to sunset) everyday since the start of ‘Ramadan’. I was very surprised that he had all of a sudden turned religious comparing what I knew about him just three weeks ago. Its not an easy job to be fasting from sunrise to sunset, going to work, and also attending classes at night for a month, since I knew that he had never done this before in his life. It requires quite a commitment. He told me that he would be fine, when I reminded him of the hardship he would face to accomplish these. I was pleasantly surprised at his calmness about all these, as if he was in peace with himself. I asked him about his ‘drum circle’ and to my surprise, he told me that he had not done this for a while. I stayed with him until evening and did the ‘Iftar’ with him i.e. broken the fast together. When I came back home and told his mother all these, she was actually happy, and both of us agreed that this was probably a good thing for him to be little religious and not doing the ‘drum circle’. We thought this would help him focus on his classes and help him graduate in time. By the end of November, Rezwan informed us that he had to quit his job with the Japanese Bakery, over a dispute that started when he got involved in a minor accident with the delivery van, while trying to deliver foods in Boston. The bakery started deducting from his paycheck the insurance deductible, and as a result, they had not paid him for last couple of weeks of work. He was very depressed about it. This did not sound legal at all to me and suggested him to talk to Better Business Bureau. Per my suggestion, he did file a complaint with the Better Business Bureau and they agreed that this was illegal and they collected the unpaid paychecks from the Bakery owner and reimbursed Rezwan. In January 2008, Rezwan started his final semester at Northeastern University. I noticed that Rezwan had reduced his friend circle considerably and had become significantly quieter even with us. He expressed that the roomy house, which he once loved, is too crowded and wants to move back home, even though his lease did not expire until the end of February, 2008. By end of January 2008, he moved back home and started commuting to school from Ashland to Boston, using his 2003 Honda Civic. He was still maintaining long distance relations with his girl friend, who had started her pre-med studies in the Columbia University in New York City, from January 2008, and couple of other friends from Northeastern University also. Rezwan had visited his girlfriend in New York City sometime around February for few days. One of his college friends went along with him, who later told us that Rezwan refused to have any alcoholic beverage in that trip. His girlfriend came to visit him for few days in March. Rezwan was driving her around. I think they went to visit one of their friends from Northeastern University, who now lives in New Hampshire, for over night. Next morning after they came back, Rezwan was in the house when he was supposed to be with his girlfriend.  His mother asked him about her and his reply was she had gone back to New York because he told her that he could not be with her anymore. Rezwan’s mother and I were totally shocked in this sudden development but he refused to elaborate. After that, he became even quieter, practicing religion more, and mostly staying home, when not driving to Boston to attend his classes. We had not seen him playing drums at all, since he moved back home. In fact, I do not remember him playing drums again until his arrest.

Rezwan graduated from Northeastern University in May 2008, with a B.S. degree in Physics. He had his trademark smile on, with his big brown eyes dancing, when he received his diploma. Rezwan refused to have any graduation party. His mother really wanted to have one. Finally, under our pressure he agreed to have a small get together, just family and few friends, which we had on June 6, 2008. 

Your Honor, every Friday since middle of 2008, Rezwan went to WIC Mosque with me for Friday’s 'Jummah' Prayer and this is where, at the end of 2010, the FBI orchestrated and facilitated a plan to entrap Rezwan.

Your Honor, starting late 2008, a series of events, involving Rezwan, made us increasingly concerned that his presence of mind was diminishing and he was letting himself be manipulated, by the people, outside the house. He started searching for a job related to his major. It was a difficult time for college graduates to find a job, at the end of 2008, for the reason that we all know. Bottom of the US economy had fallen off and the country was in deep recession. He was still doing private tutoring when available, few hours a week, to give him some income. By late 2008, he had lost touch with all of his friends. He only went out of home, when he took a long walk by himself, went out to do tutoring, driving his 2003 Honda Civic, or going to Friday prayer with me.

Sometime around December 2008, Rezwan became a victim of an internet scam. It happened when he made a deal with a new tutoring agency, to work around 15 hours a week, starting from the week following the deal. He was accustomed to getting about $35.00 an hour, for tutoring math and science, and this new deal was similar. All the correspondence with the new agency was over e-mail, which he had done previously, with other tutoring agencies. After he made the deal, he got an e-mail from this new tutoring agency, stating that they had sent him his first week’s paycheck, a cashiers check, by mail. However, by mistake, they had sent him $3600.00, instead of his first week’s amount of around $500.00. They wanted him to cash the check when he got it, keep his $500.00, and send back the remaining amount to the address that they had provided in the e-mail. Surely, Rezwan received the cashier’s check by mail within couple of days. The check was against a famous US bank. Rezwan immediately, went to our local bank, where he had his account for a few years. The bank gave the money to Rezwan against the cashier check, without any questions. Rezwan kept his $500.00, which he thought was his next week’s pay, and sent the rest of the $3100.00 back to the address provided in the e-mail, via Western Union, immediately after cashing the check. He did not think, for a moment, that something might be wrong here, even though the address was overseas, UK to be precise. Obviously, our local bank found out that cashiers check was a fraud when they went to collect. They also found out that it was an internet scam, involving a group from UK, and apparently, other bank was aware of such things. Our local bank charged Rezwan anyway and wanted him to pay at least $300.00 every month. All these were happening without our knowledge. When he told us about this, we were utterly shocked. How could he allow himself to be deceived like this? Where was his commonsense? Why did he not realize something was not right, when he saw the address was in UK? He was very embarrassed. He said, all he could think was that, “this money was not mine and I had no right to keep the money even for a day.” His mother and I were puzzled. What was happening to Rezwan? What was happening to his presence of mind? He was not like this before. We lectured him about how he should be street smart like his older brother.

After this incident, we did some traveling, during the holidays. All four of us drove to New York City, around December 20, to celebrate my oldest sister’s 60th birthday party. Day after Christmas, Rezwan, along with his brother, one of his cousins, my younger brother, and I, drove to Detroit, Michigan, to attend one of his cousins wedding. Rezwan seemed to be cheerful during both trips. One thing he was always careful about, not to miss the prayer time. Muslims are supposed to pray five times a day in specific times. Rules are much lenient when traveling long distance, but Rezwan was not willing to forgo his religious duties, even though rests of us were.  

By February 2009, Rezwan landed a full time job with a medical company with decent salary. This company was just 15 minutes away from our house. He seemed quite happy and so were we. He told us that the work involved quality control but they had promised him that he would be able to get into the research and development later. He told us that the first thing he was going to do was to payoff the balance of the money that he owed to the local bank. About three months into the job, we noticed that he seemed depressed. When we asked him, how the job was going, he was reluctant to talk about it. By the end of May 2009, suddenly, Rezwan, along with some other employees, including the person who hired him got laid off, from the medical company. This was a very depressing event for him. This happened just when he finished paying off the local bank, and as a result, he was left with no money and no jobs again.

Rezwan seemed to have lost all his confidence, after he was laid off from the medical company. He became even more introvert. He started spending most of his time inside his room. He had lost his Trade Mark smile. Only time he was going out of the house, when took a walk, and on Fridays, going to WIC Mosque with me. Sometimes, when asked him about his job hunt. I got the feeling that he had stopped looking for kind of job, a college graduate, with a degree in Physics would seek. He mostly mentioned about odd jobs. We encouraged him to start his graduate study. He told us that he was thinking about pursuing Masters Degree in Math, but he had not made up his mind yet.

By August 2009, Rezwan started working for a carpet cleaning company. It was a whole night job. Cleaning carpets and doing windows in the restaurants and business offices. His mother and I were disappointed. We told him “you are a college graduate.” You should not be doing this. He told us that the owner of the business had promised him that in the beginning of 2010, the owner was going to start another business in New York City, and Rezwan would be the manager of this carpet cleaning business in Massachusetts. We asked him about the pay. He said, it was $500.00 every two weeks for now, but next year he could make up to $1500.00 a week, when he assumed the responsibility of the operations. We could not believe what we were hearing. We reminded him that he was working almost 50 to 60 hours a week, which cames to way less than minimum wage an hour. We reminded him “you are a college graduate, an American citizen, and you are being paid like an illegal immigrant.”  Rezwan replied, it was like training, because he did not have any carpet cleaning experience. After a month and a half, Rezwan looked terrible in his appearance, due to lack of sleep, nights after nights, and not able to complete his sleep during the day. All his pants now had holes around the knees and became discolored from using strong chemicals products, used for carpet and window cleaning. He asked his mother for some money to put gas in the car, because he had not been paid yet, and told us that he spends a lot of gas because he was ferrying employees from one job location to another. We asked him, why he was not being paid. His reply was, he mailed all the invoices to the businesses, but the owner said he had not received any payments yet, and when the payment were received, he would pay Rezwan all the money at once. We were suspicious and told Rezwan that we did not had a good feeling about all this. We told him that this person was manipulating him. Rezwan seemed to understand our point but at the same time reluctant to behave aggressively because he still thinks, he would be in charge from next year. By the end of October, he got paid $500.00 and later, by the end of December, he received another $500.00. We kept telling him that he was being controlled and manipulated by this ‘person’ and should quit the carpet cleaning job, and tell this ‘person’ that he could not work without pay anymore. We also start putting pressure on him to go back to school and start his graduate study in Math. Rezwan seemed very confused and lost his will power to say ‘no’ to this ‘person’. Constant pressure from us also got him very annoyed and irritated with us, specially, with his brother. Suddenly, sometime before Christmas, 2009, all four of us were having dinner in our kitchen and Rezwan seemed quite cheerful. He announced that the Graduate School of Social Sciences, at the University of Massachusetts, Lowell, accepted him to pursue Master of Science in Math. He showed us the acceptance letter. Program was going to start from September of 2010. We told him that we were very happy and suggested that he should stop working for this ‘person’ now. In the beginning of January 2010, Rezwan stopped going to carpet cleaning job. I was not sure whether he just stopped going or he had told this ‘person’ that he is not working anymore. One Friday in January 2010, I was home as part of my regular day off (my employer Raytheon Company which follows a 9/80 schedule and I had every other Friday off) from work. Around 10 in the morning, front door bell in the house rang. Our dog Ziggy started barking. I was in the kitchen and went to open the front door. I opened the door and this imposing figure, quite tall and bulky, around my age, asked, if he could talk to Rezwan. When I inquired, who he was, he told me that he was the owner of the carpet cleaning business, and wanted to talk to Rezwan. I was very annoyed, and found it bizarre that he had come to our house unannounced. Nonetheless, I called Rezwan, who was upstairs in his room. Rezwan came down, saw him, but without saying anything proceeded to the TV room next to the kitchen and sat on a sofa. This ‘person’ followed him to the TV room and stood right in front of Rezwan. I followed them to the TV room also. It was little scary because this ‘person’ was an imposing figure and had a very deep voice. He kept asking Rezwan, why he was not coming to work, and Rezwan sat silently without answering. I responded, saying, “Rezwan can not work for you. You have not paid him for his work. You must pay people when they work for you.” This ‘person’ just ignored me. He kept talking to Rezwan directly, telling why he should come to work. Rezwan still kept silent. I started telling, “Rezwan, tell him you can not work for him because he does not pay you.” Even though, I was standing right near Rezwan, in our house, still it took him for a while to find courage and finally told this ‘person’ that he was not going to work for him. The ‘person’ left as soon as Rezwan told him that he could not work for him. I saw Rezwan’s face brighten up in huge relief. Rezwan went back to his room upstairs. I was speechless and very scared for Rezwan. I kept thinking, what was going on with his mind? Why he had lost all his courage, self-confidence, and self-respect? I got the feeling that he did not understand anymore that others were manipulating him. We are seeing a Rezwan totally unknown to us. This was very sad and scary.

Your Honor, since the above incident, he became even more secluded from us. He started showing hostility towards his brother and a certain degree towards me. He used to be very close with his brother. They did everything together. I remember, when they were in High School, even though, they had their separate bedrooms, they moved in the same room for a while. His mother and I were heart broken by his hostility towards his brother. We could not understand the reason. We asked his brother if he understands the reason. His brother said he had no clue, and started avoiding Rezwan as much as possible. Fortunately, he was still close to his mother. In the evening, he would hang around his mother. Sometimes, on Saturday or Sunday, he and his mother went out for breakfast. I actually liked this very much that he was close to his mother.

Until recently, Rezwan used to sit with his brother and myself and watch professional sports like Soccer, Basketball, Football, and Baseball. He specially loved watching Boston Celtics games. It was Rezwan who used to expressed his emotion loudest, during the game, with the ups and down of Celtics or Patriots or Red Sox. One could found out the performance of a team from the next room just listening to Rezwan’s loud outburst. He was no longer sitting with us and watching games. I used to love watching Boston Red Sox games every evening and remember every highs and heartbreaks involving Red Sox since early 1980. Before, he would often join me, when he was around. Throughout the 2010 Red Sox season, when I am watching the game, sometimes, he would come down from his room upstairs, look at me while going towards the kitchen. I will ask him to join me but he would kind of shrug me off, go to kitchen, pickup a glass of water or something and go sit with his mother in the study room, where she was watching her TV.

Rezwan was still driving his 2003 Honda Civic. Every now and then, he drove to visit a young couple who lived in the Boston’s Roxbury neighborhood. He never told us much about them even when we asked. Only thing he told us about them that they were Muslims, expecting a baby, and living in financial hardship. Sometimes, he used to ask his mother to cook some food for them. His mother would cook and he would take some food to them. Even during 2011, he continued to visit this couple. From October 2010, he did not have any car so he went to visit them by train.

Through out 2010, every Friday, Rezwan was still going to WIC mosque with me for Friday prayer. I would drive while he was sitting besides me. About 40 minutes drive. I used to consider this our special time. However, he would seldom talk on his own. Sometimes I would ask him about job search. Sometimes he would reply in few words and sometimes he would say he did not want to talk about it now. Throughout 2010, he only had couple of odd jobs, here and there, for not more than few weeks each time. I noticed that he had developed kind of friendship with couple of young man in the WIC mosque. One of them is an Irish American who converted to Islam in WIC mosque, sometime around 2009. This young man has disability and moves around in a Wheel Chair. Rezwan liked to help him around. Some days after the prayer, he would tell me that he would like to stay and hang out with them. I was somewhat happy that he had found these young men of his age with whom he could spend some time. Ladies sell lunch after the Friday prayer in the mosque to help raise fund for the mosque. I used to buy lunch for the family to bring home every Friday after prayer. I would give him his lunch along with $20.00 and asked him to call his mother or me when he wanted to come home. Normally, he would call his mother after the night prayer around 10:00PM to come and get him. Sometimes, he would come back by commuter train that runs between Worcester and Boston and one of us would pick him up from at Ashland station. Occasionally, Rezwan would drive his Honda Civic to WIC mosque before Friday prayer. He would tell me he was going to pickup his disabled friend from his home and drive him to mosque.

First 10 days of September 2010, which happened to be the last 10 days of holy month of Ramadan that year, Rezwan told me that he was going to pass these days in the mosque as many other Muslims do. His mother and I were worried because we knew his mental health was not ok and others could manipulate him easily. It would be difficult to communicate with him because he would have to turn off his cell phone when he was inside the mosque. We reluctantly agreed and Rezwan went to pass his last 10 days of holy month of Ramadan in the WIC mosque. We requested him to call us whenever he could. Following Friday, when I went to the mosque, I could not find him in the WIC mosque. I did not find his friend in wheel chair either. I saw his other friend who was also spending the last 10 days of Ramadan in the WIC mosque, he told me that Rezwan, and his other friend had gone to Boston because it was too crowded here. He could not tell me which Boston mosque they had gone. After I came home, I started calling his cell phone, left messages, but he did not call back. We were in panic mode, when he did not call back until Saturday morning. I had never been to any Boston mosque before. Searching the web, I collected the address for few mosques including the new Boston Islamic Center mosque in Roxbury and drove to Boston. I went around all the mosques but failed to locate him. Now really panicking, I came back home in the afternoon. When I told his mother, she was so scared that she said she was going to call the police. I called his cell phone again and to my utter surprise, a voice said ‘hello’ but it was not Rezwan. This person told me, with broken English, that he had found Rezwan’s cell phone in the washroom of Boston Islamic Center mosque in Roxbury. I told the person that this phone belongs to my son Rezwan; he must have left it in the washroom and obviously could not find it now. I described Rezwan to him because he did not know who he was. He told me that he is now home but would be in mosque for evening prayer and also gave me his name. At least we know now which mosque Rezwan went. I visited this mosque in the morning and must have missed Rezwan somehow because it is a big mosque. I drove to Boston Islamic center mosque again and sure enough, I found Rezwan and his friend in wheel chair there. Rezwan told me that he had lost his cell phone, then I told him how I was here in the morning and how this person found his phone, and I have talked to him, and he would be here for the evening prayer. Rezwan called his own cell phone from mine and was able to locate the person who game him back his cell phone. Rezwan was very happy and thanked the person a lot. Rezwan told me that they were there for last few days and would stay until the last day of Ramadan. I was so relieved, called his mother to let her know that I found Rezwan, and came back home after the evening prayer. On my way back home, I kept thinking, he could have called us from somebody else’s phone. How could he loose his sense of responsibility like this? I got the feeling that he did not even realize the gravity of the situation.

FBI CASTING A SHADOW:

Your Honor, the FBI knew about his mental issues at least since October 21st of 2010, when they came to our house to ask questions about a person (not Rezwan} who went to a gun shop. This was the time, when anybody with reasonable intelligence after talking to Rezwan for couple of minutes could figure it out that he was not in his right mind. Rezwan refused to tell the name of the person and kept telling, “It’s all racist… it’s all racist”. At the end of the interview, where I was also present, both FBI agents (names are deliberately withheld) on their way out told me, standing in the garage of our house, "obviously he has mental issues". I told them how we (family) were trying to take him to a Psychiatrist but how Rezwan at the time was totally against seeking any medical help. I even asked them if there was a way to take him to see a doctor. One of the agents replied "don't push him too much, he will not trust you". One of the agents left his business card with me and asked if I hear anything I could call, not that I had to call. Therefore, the FBI was aware of his mental issues since October 21, 2010.

Your Honor, since the above incident, Rezwan’s mental and physical health took a serious downturn. He became very hostile to his brother to the point that he could not even tolerate his presence. In fact, by the end of December 2010, he did not recognize Fahi (Farhad) as his brother. He used to tell people he did not have a brother. Even though we knew that he did not understand what he was saying, still it was devastating for his brother, his mother and me. His mother would cry, hug him, and told him “Don’t say that... You know he is your brother... We have two sons, you and Fahi.” Sometimes he would also cry while she was hugging him. Sometimes he would try to get away from her hug and say, “I don’t think so….” He no longer trusted me either and had this suspicious look in his face every time I talked to him. Sometime he would show open hostility towards me. Only person he was still nice to, was his mother.

Your Honor, the most troubling of all, by December 2010, he was no longer able to control his bladder. He was going in and out of bathroom every few minutes, specially, at night. We could hear from our bedroom, toilet flushing, water running, every few minutes. Night after Night, he could not sleep. In addition, we were not sleeping because of all the sounds that he was making. In the morning, I would pick into his room and would find him lying on the floor trying to sleep. Few comforters, bed sheets, shirts and pajamas, piled up on his bed. At day, he would try to do laundry, which was a difficult job with the comforters. We tried to help him out but it was not easy because this was a daily occurrence. Watching him suffer like this broke our heart. Eventually, it became a daunting task for him and us, so, I gave him two comforters, two sets of bed sheets, and put a lock in the linen closet. I told him if he could try not using more than these two sets a day. It was very painful to watch him like this. He had lost a lot of weight, his cheek bones were visible and eyes were always red. He was highly irritable and sometimes disoriented. We again, suggested him to go see a doctor but he refused. His mother and I would sometimes check the dirty cloths but did not see that all of them were dirty. We got the feeling that he thought he was dirtying the clothes even though he was not. I suggested him, I could buy man’s diapers, nobody had to know, and, at least, this would enable him to sleep without worrying that he was going to dirty his clothes. He refused. He is a young man and still had his pride. I told him that when people get sick they do things that make them better. It was nothing to be ashamed of, especially, when nobody was going to know.  By March 2011, he gave up, no matter how demeaning it was, and agreed to wear diapers. I started buying 28 packs man’s diapers, which he was using up in just four or five days.

Your Honor, I think, I understand now why he agreed to wear diapers. Here is a piece of news reported by Associated Press after the bail hearing on November 4, 2011. “FBI Special Agent Bradley Davis” “acknowledged that the FBI had received during the investigation reports about bizarre behavior by Ferdaus, including a report to Hopkinton police in February that he was standing in the road not moving and appeared to have wet his pants. ”

Your Honor, we were not aware of the above incident until that day in the courtroom. I remember tears rolling down my eyes, when I heard this, and kept thinking, how a young man like Rezwan felt when something like this happened. I could not even imagine how demeaning and shameful it must have been for him, when he was unable to control his mind and body.

We, including his aunts and uncles, who are physicians, tried to convince him that he had a medical condition, and he must go see a doctor. We used to tell him when people get sick, they should see a doctor, and we are sure there are medications that could help him. We used to remind him when he was young, any discomfort that he felt, he would urge us to take him to Hospital. However, all our efforts failed. He would tell us “I don’t want to fill up my body with any kind of chemicals.” We were also cautious not to pressure him too much. I always remembered what the two FBI agents told me on October 21, 2010, "don't push him too much, he will not trust you."

Your Honor, by the end of 2010 and beginning of 2011, when we were trying our best to take him to a doctor, we had no clue that a powerful force was already working against us. A powerful force for whom we were no match, had already encircled Rezwan, and manipulating him, in order to manufacture a terror plot, that would be entirely “Orchestrated and Facilitated” by that force.

Your Honor, this force was none other than our own FBI, who was already aware of Rezwan’s mental issues since October 21, 2010, and still went ahead with targeting him, knowing that he was an easy prey. In fact, we believe, this day of October 21, 2010, was a pivotal day, in this tragic saga, when the FBI confirmed their perfect prey:

1. a young educated Muslim American who was religious, an automatic suspect according to FBI training material that suggest all religious Muslims are potential terrorist,
2. who was loyal to his friend to the point that he won’t give away his friend’s identity to FBI, and
3. who had obvious mental issues, making him vulnerable to manipulation.

FBI sent 'gangster' and 'heroin addict' informant, whom they called Collaborating Witness (CW), to the Worcester Islamic Center (WIC) Mosque to entrap Rezwan. The informant, a non-Muslim, hanged out in the mosque pretending to be a Muslim, and identified himself as ‘Khalil’ from Connecticut of Egyptian descent. The informant's record as established in court and reported by the Boston News Station WBUR on November 8th, 2011, was: "two convictions for selling drugs, unlawful restraint, a robbery conviction whose eight-year sentence he cut down to three by cooperating as a government witness elsewhere."

Your Honor, I first met this ‘Khalil’ on January 7, 2011, in the WIC mosque and obviously, did not know his actual identity until after Rezwan’s arrest on September 28, 2011, when I read the affidavit and started putting things together. It was a Friday, Rezwan and I had gone to the mosque for Friday prayer, around 1:00PM, just like any other Friday. In the mosque prayer hall, I always set behind Rezwan to make sure that he was ok. Since, two FBI agents came to our house on October 21, 2010; I was in a lookout to see if anybody matches the descriptions of the man who went to a gun shop. Friday prayer starts at 1:30PM after the sermon is over. About 10 minutes before the prayer start time Rezwan got up and went to the washroom. I was keeping an eye on the entrance of the washroom to make sure that he was back in time for prayer. Prayer was about to start and all the people had stood up to form the lines for prayer. I was anxious because no sign of Rezwan yet, but to my relieve he appeared in the entrance and approached near his previous place for the prayer, a couple of rows ahead of me. I could see his pants and shirt were wet in several places, must be from the ‘odu’ a ritual cleansing with water, which must be performed, before prayer. Prayer is always lead by an ‘Imam’. Starts with rows of people standing behind him and ends with people sitting behind him in the same rows. Everybody observe complete silence except the ‘Imam’ who recite the ‘suras’ or verses of ‘Quran’ during the prayer. Even after the prayer people sit in complete silence for few seconds.  The prayer hall, which is quite long and holds somewhere, between 150 to 200 people in a row during the prayer, and there were at least 10 rows altogether that day. The prayer ended around 1:40PM. Immediately after the prayer, while people were still sitting in silence, I heard this loud voice from the other side of the prayer hall, calling “Rezwan, Rezwan”. This is quite unusual inside the mosque. Immediately, I looked at the direction of the voice and saw this bulky man with little hair on head fast approaching towards Rezwan. I have never seen him before anywhere and got the feeling that he knew Rezwan well. Both Rezwan and I stood up and this man came to Rezwan and shook his hand. Now I could see he was little shorter than Rezwan, stocky, had a light ‘go-tee’ in his chin, and had a scar in his left chick. Immediately, I thought, this must be the man; two FBI agents had described when they came to our house on October 21, 2010, to talk to Rezwan about a person who went to a gun shop. Rezwan pointed at me and told him “my father”. I am thinking, finally I found him. I told both of them “let’s go downstairs and we can talk”. We came down stairs where the women sold lunches. I shook hands with the man and asked, “What is your name?” He replied “Khalil”. I asked, “Where are you from?” He replied, “I am from Connecticut”. I said, “Connecticut! Where are your parents from?” he replied, “Egypt”. His English had a heavy accent. I actually believed him. I could feel that both Rezwan and him were not comfortable with my questioning. Rezwan told me he wants to stay in the mosque like many other days. I bought lunch for Rezwan, ‘Khalil’, and for the family like every Friday, and handed over their lunch boxes to Rezwan, gave him $20.00 dollars, and told Rezwan to call when he was ready to come home. When Rezwan came home that night, I am not sure now whether he came back by train or his mother went to pick him up, I asked him whether ‘Khalil’ was the man who went to the gun shop. Rezwan said he was not the man and until now, I really do not know who it was. However, we were still suspicious, motivated by one and one thing only, that is to protect Rezwan because we know he was vulnerable due to his mental illness. I kept asking him, how they met, because I had never seen him before in the mosque. Finally, Rezwan said, couple of weeks ago on a Friday after I left the mosque. ‘Khalil’ was staring at Rezwan inside the mosque. Suddenly he approached Rezwan and gave him a hug, which is quite common among Muslims, specially, after Friday prayer. Rezwan asked ‘Khalil’ “have we met before?” ‘Khalil’ replied “yeah”. I thought if he met ‘Khalil’ just couple of weeks ago then this person could not be the one who went to a gun shop. I must admit that my suspicion of ‘Khalil’ being the person who went to a gun shop was not hundred percent cleared. I carried this suspicion even after Rezwan’s arrest, but I was told by the appropriate party that ‘Khalil’ was not the person who went to a gun shop.

Your Honor, one think I know now, this ‘Khalil’ was none other than the ‘CW’ mentioned in the affidavit. I feel tremendous agony every time I remember the above encounter on January 7, 2011, and cannot help but think, if I had brought Rezwan home with me that day, may be Rezwan’s fate would have been different from what it is now.

(According to affidavit, January 7, 2011, was the day, ‘Khalil’ made the first recording of Rezwan, right in front of the mosque entrance, a few feet away from the place where I left them on that day. Affidavit states “FERDAUS met with the CW” implying that it was Rezwan, who took the initiative. We know this is not true from the description of my encounter with the CW on January 7, 2011. He had to be wired already, when I first met him inside the mosque. What was the conversation CW had with Rezwan before the recording? Given what we know about CW now, why should we not believe that CW was manipulating Rezwan’s mind prior to do the recording?)

(When did CW first met Rezwan? We now know that Rezwan’s version described above was correct because during the bail hearing on November 4, 2011, FBI Special Agent Bradley Davis put the date on December 17, 2010. Since December 17, 2010 was a Friday, it must be after Friday prayer in WIC mosque and after I had left for the home.) (What were the circumstances when Rezwan first meet CW? We know the answer to this question from the above paragraph. The sole purpose of this non-Muslim CW inside the mosque was to entrap Rezwan. CW initiated the entrapment process in an opportune moment, like a seasoned predator, by introducing himself to Rezwan with a hug. Remember when Rezwan asked ‘Khalil’ “have we met before?” ‘Khalil’ replied “yeah”. We know that December 17, 2010, was the first encounter between Rezwan and CW, then why CW answered Rezwan’s question with a “yeah”?  Do you think the intention was to confuse Rezwan with the full knowledge that he had mental illness?)

After January 7, 2011, he started calling our house a lot. Always in our home telephone (Land Line). Sometimes, he would call repeatedly within a very short period of time e.g. an hour. My wife even told him once, “why do you call here so much, you have no jobs to do?” Few Fridays, I have seen him in the WIC mosque talking to Rezwan, in the prayer hall and in downstairs before and after the Friday prayer. One Friday, most likely on January 21, after the prayer Rezwan told me he was going to stay in the mosque. As usual, I bought lunch for him and gave $20.00. I remember it was a very snowy January. Mosque parking lot was grid locked with cars. As I was negotiating my way in the slippery parking lot towards my car, I saw Rezwan and ‘Khalil’ sitting inside a huge American built green SUV. I waved at them and they waived back.

(In the affidavit, January 20 is a date mentioned when Rezwan’s conversations was recorded. However, January 20 was a Thursday. How did Rezwan meet CW on that day? Remember, Rezwan did not have any car. If January 20 was correct, then, why, January 21 meeting was not mention in the affidavit? I wonder how many other times they met and not mentioned in affidavit and the times that they met and not mentioned in affidavit, what they were discussing. Could it be that CW was coaching and manipulating Rezwan’s mind because they knew he was having mental issues.)

(In the affidavit, January 20, 2011, meeting is mentioned between Rezwan and CW on paragraph 18 and 19, then, on paragraph 20, next meeting date is identified as March 2, 2011. Almost month and half is missing in between. Remember, “FBI Special Agent Bradley Davis” “acknowledged that the FBI had received during the investigation reports about bizarre behavior by Ferdaus, including a report to Hopkinton police in February that he was standing in the road not moving and appeared to have wet his pants. ”  Do you think this sudden gap of month and a half has anything to do with above incident?)

(During the bail hearing on November 04, 2011, Bradley Davis acknowledged there was a meeting on February 11, 2011, between CW and Rezwan. After the meeting, CW told FBI Rezwan was acting crazy. Why there was no mention of this meeting in affidavit? Is it because, it exposes FBI’s illegal behavior of framing a mentally unstable person? What kind of stuff CW was suggesting to Rezwan in this meeting who he thought was crazy?)

Your Honor, there was this major incident involving ‘Khalil’, Rezwan, and Farhad (Rezwan’s older brother) on first week of March 2011. I was at work in my office located at Tewksbury, MA; about 42 miles away from our house. Around 11:00AM, I received a phone call from our older son Farhad. He was crying. I was very worried and told him to take a breather, and asked what happened. Farhad told me that he got into this argument leading to a fistfight with Rezwan because of ‘Khalil’. He told me that ‘Khalil’ was calling our house every few minutes wanting to talk to Rezwan. It was very annoying that telephone was ringing every few minutes. Rezwan did pick up the phone few times but ‘Khalil’ kept calling. Farhad told me that he was so annoyed, once he picked up the phone and told ‘Khalil’ not to call our house any more. These were the days when Rezwan did not even recognized Farhad as his brother. Rezwan was very upset at Farhad, started arguing leading to fistfight, and punched Farhad on the lips. Farhad told me that he had a little cut but he was ok now. I asked him “where is Rezwan now?” He told me ‘Khalil’ came and threatened him and then left with Rezwan. I felt it was an urgent matter and must go home immediately. I told Farhad, “I am coming right away”, hanged up the phone, turned my computer off, and left my office in a hurry, and drove back home. I was home within fifty minutes. All the way while driving back home, I was praying, “dear god, please keep Rezwan safe.” Farhad told me ‘Khalil’ came and pressed the front bell and when Farhad picked through the small window adjacent to the door, he first, saw Rezwan and told him to leave. Then he saw ‘Khalil’ standing by the door in front of Rezwan. Farhad told ‘Khalil’ to leave also.  ‘Khalil’ challenged him, “come outside and face it like a man.”  Farhad told me he was scared and told ‘Khalil’ “Leave or I will call police.”  Farhad told me that Rezwan was telling ‘Khalil’ “lets just leave”. I looked at the caller ID in our telephone handset and saw, many, many, calls from the same number. I called back the number and sure enough, it was ‘Khalil’, who answered. I asked him “where is Rezwan?” and he replied, “your other son was trying to beat him up. I picked him up. Bought him lunch and dropped him near your house.”  I told him, “You know, Rezwan was such a nice boy, a good student. I do not know what has gotten into him lately.” He told me “he opens up to me. I can make him talk.”  I asked him “did Rezwan tell you anything?”  He told me “yes, he has gang problem.” I said shockingly “gang problem! What kind of gang problem!”  He told me “Rezwan owes lots of money to gangs.” I had hard time believing that Rezwan would be involved with any gangs. I asked him “how much money?” He told me “thirteen, fourteen thousand dollars.”  Immediately, I had a strange feeling about what he was saying. I became suspicious and started thinking, “is this guy trying to scam me?”  I asked him “what do you do?” He replied, “I am a Psychiatrist you know. I went to Harvard you know.” Now I am very suspicious. I told him “you look very young to be a Psychiatrist. Went to Harvard! Where is your office?” He replied, “Worcester.” I said, “where is in Worcester? Can I have the address? I like to visit your office to talk about Rezwan.” He replied, “I will give you my business card when I see you in the mosque next Friday.” Our conversation ended. I hanged up the phone. Immediately, I told Farhad “I think this guy is trying to scam me.” I then told him about my conversation with ‘Khalil’. Still there was no sign of Rezwan. It was very cold out and I was worried sick. I think it was after 3:00PM, Rezwan came back home. He looked very cold and wet. Almost two hours he was walking around. I hugged him and asked if he was ok. He told me he was. When I told Rezwan, “‘Khalil’ told me that he is a Psychiatrist. Is it true?”  Rezwan looked at me with disbelief and told me “he won’t tell you that. He is a construction worker. He is a roofer.” I did not tell Rezwan any further about my conversation with ‘Khalil’. I had no doubt anymore that ‘Khalil’ was trying to swindle me of thirteen or fourteen thousand dollars. When my wife came home that day, I told her about my conversation with ‘Khalil’ and we could not stopped thinking, here we go again, Rezwan is being controlled and manipulated by another bad guy.

(According to affidavit, on March 2, 2011, CW came to pickup Rezwan from our house. It was a recorded meeting. All those phone calls that CW made to our house on that day prior to picking Rezwan up, do you think that’s because, Rezwan was not willing to go out but he was coerced into? )

(According to affidavit, CW picked up Rezwan from our house only twice, January 11 and March 2 of 2011. However, we know for sure, that he had picked up Rezwan from our house or nearby our house, at least three other times, if not more, after March 2 and first week of April. One of these time Rezwan’s mother met CW and Rezwan right on our driveway. She looked at CW and said ‘hello’ but he did not make any eye contact to her. She thought, probably because he was a Muslim and not supposed to look at women’s eyes. Now, that we know who he was, she always blamed herself that she could not protect her son who was having mental issues that day. Why there is no mention in the affidavit, of other days, that CW came to our house to pick up Rezwan? Could this be because it shows aggressive pursuit of Rezwan?)     

Next Friday, March 4, 2011, I met ‘Khalil’ in the WIC mosque, after the prayer and even though I knew by then, he was a fraud, I asked him about his business card just to see what kind of excuse he would give. He told me, he forgot to bring the card and vanished in the crowd. Rezwan wanted to stay in the mosque. I insisted, he should come back with me. He started to become irritated. I still remember the advice, "don't push him too much, he will not trust you."  As usual, I bought lunch for him and the family; gave him his lunch and $20.00, told him to be careful, and left reluctantly.

(According to affidavit, CW had a recorded meeting with Rezwan on this day. He took Rezwan to a library and some other stores.)

Your Honor, throughout March and up to the middle of April 2011, I have seen ‘Khalil’ most Fridays in the WIC mosque prayer hall and in downstairs after the prayer. Suddenly, by middle of April 2011, he vanished i.e. I had not seen him anymore until Rezwan’s arrest.

(In the affidavit, there is no more mention of Rezwan’s meeting with CW after April 6, 2011. According to affidavit, Rezwan and CW met only two Fridays in March, which are 4th and 18th. What was happening on other Fridays in March (11 and 25), and on April 1? What CW was telling Rezwan on those days? Remember, we always have to measure CW in the context of what we know about him now.)

Your Honor, before ‘Khalil’ vanished, he tried to pull one more trick on us through Rezwan, in order to swindle money from us. Sometime in late March or beginning of April, one evening around 9:00PM, he kept calling our house phone, wanted to talk to Rezwan. It was very annoying. Rezwan was displaying his displeasure and annoyance also, since he knew both his mother and I no longer approve his contact with ‘Khalil’. After few calls from ‘Khalil’, Rezwan reluctantly went to his mother and asked, if he could borough $150.00 from her. When his mother asked, why he needed the money, he told her that ‘Khalil’ was on the phone; his mother had passed away, and he needs the money for the funeral, because Muslims needs to bury their dead within 24 hours. Rezwan’s mother was suspicious and asked Rezwan to give her the phone so that she could talk to ‘Khalil’. When my wife got the phone, she could hear highly profane language in the background, by a female voice towards ‘Khalil’, who was replying in equal profanity. My wife told ‘Khalil’ to stop his foul language otherwise she could not talk. He told her about his mother passing away; he had most of the money given by other family members, just needed $150.00 from Rezwan that he promised. My wife told him that Rezwan did not have money, because he did not work. My wife could still hear profane language coming from background. She asked ‘Khalil’ who it was and he told her that it was his wife. My wife could hardly understand ‘Khalil’, who seemed to her under the influence of something. So, she asked, if she could talk to his wife. He handed the phone to his wife. My wife asked her name. She said her name was ‘Juanita’. My wife first asked if she was Spanish. ‘Juanita’ said ‘yes’. My wife asked ‘Juanita’ about ‘Khalil’s mother and she said yes, his mother passed away, they need this $150.00 because they have the rest. My wife asked ‘Juanita’ where they were and she replied, they were in a gas station on Route 9, near Shrewsbury, MA. My wife was now feeling bad and told her to drive to our house. My wife told her she did not have the money with her but willing to go to a local bank and get the money for them. ‘Juanita’ told my wife the car had no gas and they had no money. This point my wife was sold and asked ‘Juanita’ about their location so that she could drive there with Rezwan to give the money. ‘Juanita’ told my wife some location in Route 9, and they hang up the phone. After my wife hang up the phone, she started thinking, she became suspicious about this whole story and told Rezwan, it did not sound right. She called them back looking at our caller ID. ‘Juanita’ answered. My wife told ‘Juanita’ that, she works for Department of Transitional Assistance (DTA). She explains to ‘Juanita’ how they can get the money from the welfare for the funeral tomorrow, but if they came to our house, she would try to get them the money. After my wife hang up the phone, Rezwan started arguing with her saying they need the money now; he could give ‘Khalil’ his Laptop, which ‘Khalil’ could sell to get the money. My wife immediately went to Rezwan’s room, grabbed his Laptop, and told him, “this Laptop is not yours, we bought it for you and you cannot give or sell it to anybody.” After about 45 minutes, when they did not show up at the house, my wife called back. ‘Juanita’ picked up. My wife asked, “where are you now? Are you coming here?” ‘Juanita’ replied “we were somewhere in Route 9, no gas, no money, so called my cousin, who came and picked us up, now we are home.” My wife hang up the phone. After hanging up, my wife told Rezwan and me that, she did not believe them.

(According to affidavit,  Rezwan and CW met on January 7 (Friday), January 11 (Tuesday), January 20 (Thursday), March 2 (Wednesday), March 4 (Friday), March 9 (Wednesday), March 16 (Wednesday), March 18 (Friday), March 23 (Wednesday), March 28 (Monday), April 6 (Wednesday) of 2011. Since Rezwan had no car, no cell phone, and no money, only way Rezwan could initiate contact would be on Fridays, when he went to WIC mosque with me. Even then, CW, a non-Muslim had to be inside mosque to initiate contact. All other days, it was CW, who initiated the contact, and pursued Rezwan very aggressively and did whatever was required to manipulate and brainwash Rezwan, who was suffering from mental illness. Knowing CW’s criminal history, doing whatever is required to satisfy his ‘heroine’ addictions, and the few incidents that I have described above to swindle us, along with the fact that he was caught stealing from Radio Shack, and was arrested twice, while he was on FBI’s payroll; why should we think otherwise?)

(After the bail hearing following was reported by Boston’s WBUR on November 8, 2011: “This was the first person the FBI sent out on the secret mission. From the agent who signed the informant up, the defense attorney extracted the following: On one wire, Khalil is heard to say that he’s dope sick and needs a gram; he shoplifts while wearing the wire. He got paid $10,000 by the FBI for his work with Ferdaus, $40,000 more for his informant work elsewhere. And in April, when the FBI rented a room for Khalil and his girlfriend and she was blamed for trashing it, the FBI paid those damages, too. But Woudenberg said he never gave his informant a drug test.” Is it because the drug test would make it official, and he must be terminated, according to FBI’s rule? Your Honor, is it not clear beyond a shadow of doubt that CW, was given total freedom, to do whatever was necessary to manufacture a terror plot using a person who was mentally ill and vulnerable to suggestions?)

Your Honor, on March 26, 2011, both Rezwan and his brother were invited for a house warming party in New York City by one of their cousins. Rezwan showed interest, but he was not going to go with his brother, whom, he did not even recognize as his brother. Rezwan’s mother and I were quite happy that he showed interest, because we know that this would be a big change for him. His brother volunteered not to go, so that Rezwan would feel free to go. Rezwan and we talked and agreed that he would take the bus from Boston’s South Station. All my sisters live in New York City, so, I called up one of my sisters and made sure that my nephew would pick him up from the Jamaica Ave Subway Station in Queens, New York, and take him to their house. Rezwan would take subway after getting off in Manhattan Bus Terminal to go to Queens. My nephew, who was also going to the party, would accompany Rezwan to the party and would bring Rezwan back to my sister’s house, when the party was over. On Saturday, March 26, 2011, Rezwan’s mother drove him to Framingham commuter train station, from where Rezwan would take train to Boston’s South Station Bus Terminal. Rezwan was quite familiar with commuter train, which he had taken many times before. Rezwan did not have any cell phone, so my wife bought him a disposable cell phone from a 24/7 store on the way to Framingham station. We were in contact with him always. As planned, my nephew picked him up from the Jamaica Ave Subway Station in Queens, New York, between 2:00PM and 3:00PM, and took him to their house in Queens. At that time, Rezwan’s grandmother (my mother) was staying there also. Rezwan loves his grandmother very much. Rezwan and my nephew left the house to go to the party around 7:00PM and came back around 10:00PM to my sister’s house. Rezwan called his mother around 8:00PM and told her that now he was sitting in a restaurant, but before that, he was in the downstairs lobby of his cousin’s apartment building. His mother asked why he was not upstairs in the apartment of his cousin with everybody else. Rezwan told her that he was there but it was too much for him so he came downstairs, but he was going back again. Later, I found out from my nephew that Rezwan did go back upstairs, after a while. My nephew, a Cyto Technologist, drove back and forth that evening from the party. Next morning, on Sunday March 27, around 11:00AM, my nephew dropped Rezwan in the Jamaica Ave Subway Station, so that he can take the train to Manhattan Bus Terminal in order to come back to Boston. After Rezwan arrived in Boston South Station, he took the commuter train back to Ashland and walked home from station around 10:00PM. We were very much relieved and he seemed very happy about the trip.

(According to affidavit, on March 28, 2011, Rezwan discussed his weekend visit to New York with the UCEs and CW, in the UCEs vehicle. Rezwan told them he went to an Internet place (which writer of the affidavit believes an Internet café) to conduct research “in a way that’s more secure.” We know now, that was not an Internet café. It is just a restaurant inside the ‘Whole Foods’, around the apartment building. Rezwan called his mother from there as mentioned in the above paragraph. I wonder why Rezwan would call his mother, if he was busy doing secure research. Under the questioning of three well experience “brothers” inside a crammed vehicle, do you think Rezwan was just telling what they wanted to here or at least thought they would appreciate?)

(Second week of April 2012, FBI agents went to my Nephew’s and one of my brother-in-law’s work to interview them about Rezwan and his visit to New York City on March 26 and 27, 2011. FBI agents wanted to go directly inside the medical lab where my nephew works as a Cyto Technologist. But, they were stopped at the front desk and receptionist called my Nephew. When my nephew came to front lobby, FBI agents questioned him about Rezwan;s whereabouts on those two days. My brother-in-law who is a physician, FBI agents came directly to the hospital exam room, while he was with a patient. FBI agents questioned my brother-in-law about Rezwan;s whereabouts on those two days also. These were very intimidating and embarrassing experience for them. Any reasonable person cannot stop but thinking, why FBI agents did not go to their house. They have well established home address for a very long time. Is it because they could not found their home address but found the work address only or they had other sinister motives like deliberate intimidation, specially, in New York where NYPD’s attitude towards Muslims is well documented by Associated Press investigative report.)    

Your Honor, it was the beginning of April 2011, and Rezwan was without a cell phone, for a while. His contract was terminated, because he was unable to pay. I wanted to get him in my family plan, but he refused. So, all the phone calls to him from outside used to be in our house phone. It was annoying because he was receiving many calls and most of them were from ‘Khalil’. Even when Rezwan had cell phone, ‘Khalil’ always called our house phone. Suddenly, in the beginning of April, one evening, his mother saw Rezwan with a cell phone. His mother asked where he got it and he said ‘Khalil’ gave him the phone. Immediately, his mother went ballistic. She started screaming at Rezwan, “we have thought you better never to accept anything like this from an outsider. Specially, somebody like ‘Khalil’, this is how it starts and then he is going to ask you some favor, you cannot refuse. Your father told you he can give you a phone but you said no.”  I heard the commotions and went to join them in the ‘study room’, located in the second floor. We call it ‘study room’ because since we moved in to this house, 15 years ago, Rezwan and his brother have their study desk there. This is where they would do their home works. There is a TV there. In the evening, my wife sits there and watches her TV shows while I watch Red Sox, Celtics, and Patriots etc downstairs. Since the beginning of 2010, Rezwan would spend his evenings there with his mother. Many times, he would just sit in his old desk. When I went to the ‘study room’, my wife told me about the phone and asked Rezwan to handover the cell phone, which he did. I told him that I am going to put him in my family plan tomorrow. He should have cell phone but not from outsider like ‘Khalil’. Next day I put him in my family plan and gave him a cell phone.

(Even when Rezwan had cell phone, ‘Khalil’ always called our house phone. I had a habit of checking the house phone statement every month to make sure that nothing-unusual going on. I soon realized that there was no trace of incoming calls. Therefore, all the calls that ‘Khalil’ made to Rezwan had no trace of it. I called the telephone company and they said; only way, I can get the incoming calls on a landline if requested by a lawyer. Cell phone statement has both incoming and outgoing calls. Now I know why ‘Khalil’ always called in house phone. ‘Khalil’ gave Rezwan a cell phone because I think he knew I could not see the statement of that cell phone.)

Rest of the April 2011, most of my interaction with Rezwan would be on Fridays, when we went to WIC mosque together. He would hardly talk with me in the car. He would show his displeasure if I asked him any question. Most of the Fridays, after the prayer, he stayed in the mosque. Once I asked him about ‘Khalil’s whereabouts. He told me he did not know. We were happy that ‘Khalil’ was not around. At home, he was very intolerant of his brother. If somebody (including our extended family) had called our house phone and he picked up, asking for his brother, he would say he did not have a brother. By then, he had a higher degree of hostility towards me, too. E.g. after dinner, he would wash his and his mother’s plate but would leave my plate in the sink. If I asked him why he did not wash my plate, he would reply very disrespectfully “wash yourself”. I knew, he was not really, understanding, what he was saying, specially, in the context that he was very quite those days. Several physicians, who are also my family members, told me that this behavior was common among people with mental illness. His bladder control problem had become a full-blown Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD). I read the study done by the John Hopkins University on OCD. Rezwan’s behavior would be a classic example of OCD. Even though he was suffering, he still refused to visit any doctor. We were helpless, because he was over eighteen.

Your Honor, I must admit that, all of these tensions were affecting my health and my work. I have not mentioned up until now that, I am a person who had four Heart Attacks and had eight ‘Stent’ implanted in my heart. I had a high stress job as a Senior Principal Software Engineer with the defense firm ‘Raytheon Company’. Since March 2010, I informed my company that I would like to retire, when the opportunity arrived. At the end of April 2011, opportunity arrived; I got a severance package until the end of December 2011, leading to my formal retirement, starting on January 1, 2012.

Your Honor, May and June of 2011, followed the similar pattern of April that I have described in the above paragraphs, with the exception that now, I was staying home. I was paying more attention to him. To avoid further confrontation with Rezwan, his brother decided to move in with one of his friend in Boston for the summer. He took our dog Ziggy with him also. Rezwan’s brother told me at least for the summer I will have more time to spend with Rezwan. I appreciated this favor and the inconvenience that he took upon himself. Every day I was doing Rezwan’s laundry, so that he could use clean bed sheets and comforters. I would make breakfast for him. Normally, he would not come down until about 11:30AM. Even though he was using diapers at night, he still would go to bathroom couples of times at night. He would always do his early morning prayer by sunrise also. All of these were keeping him up at night, so he will try to catch up with his sleep by sleeping after his early morning prayer, until about 11:00AM. He would eat his breakfast quietly. I noticed that he had developed a new interest. Some days, after breakfast, he would ask me if I could take him to Ashland Public Library. I was happily surprised. I thought spending time in the library was a good idea. I would drop him in the library and would tell to call, when he wanted to be picked up. Library is only about two and a half miles away from our house. Some days he would call me to pick him up and some days he would walk back home. As far as I remember, most days he would not spent more than two or three hours. On Fridays, we would go to WIC mosque together. In the prayer hall, I would always sit behind him to keep an eye on him. Some days he would go to washroom before prayer and a couple of times I remember, he missed the prayer, because he had to go to washroom, when prayer started. I used to feel awful. He used to feel very disappointed on himself. Most Fridays he would stay in the mosque, when I came home. I clearly remember one Friday in May 2011; he wanted to come home with me after the prayer. After we were home, he went to his room upstairs and came back down after a short period. I saw him with a backpack and asked me if I could give him a ride to Ashland train station. I was worried and asked him where he was going. He told me that he was going to pass the weekends with his friends, young couple from Boston’s Roxbury area, that he visited sometimes, who had a baby recently. I reluctantly took him to train station and told him to be careful. Both my wife and I had talked to him on cell phone and he told us that he was fine. He came back home on Sunday. We were relieved.

(According to affidavit, on Friday the May 13, 2011, he travel to Washington, D.C. and came back on May15, 2011. UCE’s gave money to purchase plane ticket on April 19. Your Honor, here is the paragraph 33 of the affidavit in its entirety. “On April 19, 2011, FERDAUS met the UCEs. This meeting was recorded. During this meeting, the UCE’s questioned the feasibility of FERDAUS’ plan, noting that he (FERDAUS) had “nothing tangible.” FERDAUS responded in a defensive manner that he had made progress; said that he knew where to get two of the three components he needed for his plan, and said that all he needed to do was secure some funding. FERDAUS acknowledged that he needed to obtain information regarding the launch sites. FERDAUS, however, described his plan as “very close” to completion. During this meeting, with the financial assistance of the UCE’s, FERDAUS purchased a plane ticket to travel to Washington, D.C. on May 13, 2011.”  Your Honor, do you not think, paragraph 33 of the affidavit, proves beyond shadow of doubt, Rezwan was pressured (“nothing tangible.” “FERDAUS responded in a defensive manner”) and strongly suggested (“FERDAUS acknowledged”. A person only acknowledges after suggested by others, in this case UCEs) to visit Washington, D.C.?)

(It is also clear that FBI took him around while in Washington, D.C. They even allowed Rezwan to go inside the ‘Restricted Area’. You are an honorable Federal Judge; do you think you could go inside a ‘Restricted Area’ in Washington, D.C. or anywhere, without prior permission? Your Honor, I have held U.S. government ‘Secret Clearance” for last 24 consecutive years; do you think I could go inside the ‘Restricted Area’ in Washington D.C. without being stopped by the guard, even if I had flashed my badge identifying ‘Secret Clearance’?)

(Given the Rezwan’s mental and physical illness described above during the months of April and May of 2011, do you not think, a mentally ill person was subjected to nothing but a mockery in the name of “war on terror”?)

(According to affidavit, June was a very active month. UCE’s met Rezwan on June 9 (Thursday – delivered extended plan on thumb drive in a hotel room Also gave cell phone detonation device.), June 15 (Wednesday), June 17 (Friday – got $450.00 to rent storage which he did on the same day),  and June 27 (Monday- gave second cell phone detonation device and key of the storage). All these days, UCE’s were the one picking him up, taking him to a hotel room, and giving him the money to rent storage. Remember the context of Rezwan’s health. Do you think UCE’s did not know his mental and physical conditions those days? It was already six months since they started their game. They had all this opportunity to arrest him. Why did they keep leading him on?)

REZWAN ENTER’S A NEW PHASE AND ACKNOWLEDGED HIS ILLNESS:

Your Honor, second week of July 2011, Rezwan entered a potentially dangerous stage involving his mental illness. It was Friday, July 8, 2011, Rezwan and I were going to the WIC mosque for Friday prayer. We normally left the house by 12:30PM, but that day it took Rezwan longer then normal to get out of his room and join me in the car. I was kind of rushing knowing that it was already close to 12:45PM. I noticed that Rezwan stood in front of the car door for few seconds before getting into the car in the front passenger side where he always set. About six miles away from our house and about fourteen miles before the mosque, on Route 9 West, suddenly, I realized that every few seconds Rezwan was shaking his left shoulder and arm increasingly becoming harder and harder almost like he was having a seizure. With a panicked voice, I asked, “Rezwan what’s going on? Why are you shaking like this?”  He told me “I am having intrusive thoughts and cannot get rid of them.”  I said “what do you mean intrusive? Why shaking?”  He told me “bad thoughts keep coming in my mind. Shaking helps.”  I pulled over the car on the side of the road thinking he was having ‘suicidal thoughts’. I asked him “what kind of bad thoughts?” He told me “I cannot tell you now.” I asked him “should we go back home?” He said “no. go to mosque.” I started driving towards the mosque and told him “try not to shake. Keep praying”. Rest of the way to mosque he tried but could not stop shaking. In the mosque prayer hall, as usual, I sat behind him. I could see that every few seconds he kept shaking his left shoulder and arm. I noticed that some people could not help but starring at him. That day Rezwan came home with me. After his mother came back from work, I told her what happened. She told me she noticed that last night when he was sitting with her in the ‘study’ room. Rezwan told her about intrusive thoughts but also told her that it was happening only once in a while and not to worry. She did not make a big deal about it. Nevertheless, his shaking did not stop instead kept going up. This time his mother and I really started to press him about seeing a doctor. We told him we were extremely worried. He must see a doctor. This time, Rezwan also seemed concerned for himself and did not protest our request of seeing a doctor forcefully. A couple of weeks had past. Rezwan’s condition had not improved and he seemed very depressed and anxious. This was the lowest mental state we had seen him. One evening, in third week of July 2011, I was sitting downstairs in the TV room and had Boston Red Sox game on. Suddenly, Rezwan came down from his room, came to me and said, “Dad, I think I have mental problem.” Immediately, I got up and hugged him, and said “don’t worry, we are going to take care of it.” I had tears in my eyes. I called my wife and she came down. I told her what Rezwan said. She hugged him, started crying also, and told Rezwan “we are going to do everything. You are going to be fine. I am going to find doctor for you tomorrow.” Rezwan not only agreed to see doctor but also showed a sense of urgency. My wife and I were very happy that finally, he had recognized that he had problems.

Next day, my wife started calling few doctor’s offices that practices Psychiatry. Rezwan was eagerly participating with her. Who knew that getting an appointment with a Psychiatrist would prove to be a daunting task? No appointment was available until the third week of August. Rezwan’s need was more urgent than that. My wife, out of desperation, called the Psychologist whom Rezwan went to see few years back in February of 2007, and got an appointment in first week of August (some reason none of us remember the exact date) 2011. On Monday, August 1, 2011, Muslim holy month of ‘Ramadan’ had started. On the past weekend, my mother had come to visit us from New York, to stay for a couple of weeks. My mother is very religious. Rezwan, seemed to found comfort that his grandmother, would be staying with us for a while, during the holy month of ‘Ramadan’.  On the day of the appointment with the Psychologist, I drove him to my wife’s work after lunch, and from there his mother drove him to Psychologist’s office in Natick, MA. His mother had taken rest of the day off. Rezwan spent few hours with the Psychologist that day. Psychologist felt that Rezwan should start taking anti-depression medication as soon as possible. However, being a Psychologist he could not write a prescription and suggested to his mother that she should take him to his PCP, who could write the prescription for anti-depression medication, because Rezwan needed to take medication as soon as possible. Psychologist told his mother that he was going to call her later (which he did), and give her a list of Psychiatrist, whom Rezwan should call to make an appointment, and stay with one that he likes. Rezwan and his mother came home after 5:00PM. I asked Rezwan about the visit and he told me it went well. He seemed almost cheerful. We were excited too, because we were thinking, once he starts taking medication, he was going to get better. Next day my wife called his PCP and got the appointment on August 15, 2011. Rezwan with the help of his mother made three appointments with three different Psychiatrists, all between third week of August and middle of September. Appointments were easy because of the reference from his Psychologist. I remember August 15 date well, because my mother, who was staying with us, since the beginning of August 2011, needed to go back to New York on that day also. The appointment was in the afternoon. My wife again took second half of the day off to take him to PCP. After lunch, she came home and took Rezwan to PCP. Before leaving, Rezwan hugged his grandmother and said goodbye, because after leaving for PCP, I was going to drive my mother to New York. His grandmother hugged and kissed him and said a prayer for him. He seemed excited. Previously, I had given him some literature on John Hopkins University OCD program to read. I have referred the same literature, previously, on this statement. He told me that he had read other literature about OCD in internet lately. It was an astonishing turn around of his attitude towards doctors and medicine, from just a few weeks ago. I could feel, he had started to believe that he would be better when he starts to take medicine. Obviously, his mother and I were ecstatic. After Rezwan and his mother left to see PCP, I started driving towards New York with my mother around 2:00PM. By 6:00PM, we reached my oldest sister’s house in Pelham Manor, New York. Both my sister and my brother-in-law are physicians. I called my wife as soon as I reached my sister’s house. Sure enough, my wife and Rezwan just got back home after picking up his medications from CVS pharmacy in Ashland, MA. My brother-in-law talked to Rezwan and asked the name of the medicine and the dose. He assured Rezwan that this was the right medicine for him and advised, always take the medicine as prescribed and still needs to go a see a Psychiatrist. He told Rezwan that not to lose his patience, because it would take at least three weeks to feel the effect.  Rezwan started to take his anti-depressant medicine, from next morning, on August 16, 2011. We found him to be quite diligent about taking the medicine every morning, which made us optimistic about his recovery.

Rezwan’s mother took him for his first visit to a Psychiatrist in Newton, MA, sometime around third week of August 2011. The Psychiatrist wanted Rezwan to continue with the medicine that his PCP gave, and made further appointments. I asked him whether he liked this Psychiatrist and he told me “not bad” but he wanted to check out other two also. On August 31, 2011, it was the day of ‘Eid-Al-Fitr’ celebration to mark the end of holy month of ‘Ramadan’. Very uncharacteristically, Rezwan told me that he did not want to go to the WIC mosque in the morning for the ‘Eid-Al-Fitr’ prayer. It was already 2 weeks that he was taking anti-depression medication. I asked him how he was feeling. He said his bladder problem is still there and the intrusive thoughts are still happening but with less frequency. I reminded him that it was going to take few weeks, before he feels any positive effect from the medicine. I told him “Please do not get frustrated. Keep taking the medicine.” He agreed. I went to WIC mosque by myself for ‘Eid-Al-Fitr” prayer.

It happened that on August 31, 2011, Rezwan’s brother Farhad was moving back home, after staying in Boston for the summer. Our dog Ziggy was already back in home for a week or so. After the prayer, I came home quickly, changed to more casual attire and went to Boston to help Farhad move back home. We completed our move, sometime by afternoon. I told Farhad all about Rezwan’s medicine and everything. Farhad was cautiously excited. He said he would never give up on his brother. Since he started taking medicine, we were carefully observing Rezwan for any change. Rezwan saw his brother moving back, but stayed in his room quietly.  

To us it was a change in behavior for the part of Rezwan, because before, he used to display his displeasure openly when Farhad was around. His tone of voice towards me was much softer and kinder. I must admit that my wife and I had this feeling of joy inside us.

(According to affidavit, UCEs met Rezwan on July 21, August 01, 02, and 24. On July 21 Thursday, they gave him $4000.00 cash to buy remote control aircraft and watched him place order. On August 01 Monday, Rezwan delivered 3 more phone detonation device. On August 02 Tuesday, UCEs gave Rezwan another $3500.00 cash to pay the remaining balance on the remote control aircraft. On August 24 Wednesday, Rezwan delivered two more phone detonation device. That was the time when Rezwan was in pick of his mental illness, when Rezwan was telling us about his intrusive thoughts and shaking violently. Around 21 July, he told me that he thinks he had mental problems, which I have described vividly in the last four paragraphs. After the bail hearing on November 4, 2011, Associated Press Reported: During cross-examination by Ferdaus' lawyer, Miriam Conrad, Davis (FBI Special Agent Bradley Davis) acknowledged that Ferdaus told the undercover employees he was anxious and depressed and was having "intrusive thoughts" in the month before his arrest. Conrad asked Davis whether those reports "gave the FBI concern about the mental health of the target." "It's a consideration, but it's not a concern," Davis said. "Our concern was for public safety." Davis added, "Even individuals with mental health issues are a danger and a threat to the public." Your Honor, do you think this is what our FBI supposed to do with a mental patient in the name of ‘war on terror’? Would they have done this if he were not a Muslim? They gave Rezwan $4000.00 and $3500.00 cash just to play a cruel game with a mentally ill person. If we remove the FBI’s role from the game, could we even play a game? Do you think Rezwan had any means or capability that would have made him a real threat? Why did they not arrest him, when he accepted the money and placed order for the plane? Why did not they arrest him, when he delivered phone detonation devices? Were not those a crime? What kept them going to play the game another day?)

On September 01, 2011, Rezwan had his appointment with the second Psychiatrist in the afternoon at 4:00PM. I drove him to the appointment. He stayed there for a couple of hours. When he came back, he told me that he did not like him much. He wanted to see the next Psychiatrist, which appointment was on September 12, 2011.

I drove him to the appointment on September 12, 2011 with the third Psychiatrist. Rezwan seemed quite pleased, after the session. I asked him “how was it?” He told me it was good and he really liked him. He wanted to stay with this Psychiatrist. This Psychiatrist had given a new prescription doubling the dose of the medication that he was already taking. Rezwan started to take new dose from September 13, 2011, and still taking the same medicine and same dose while in Solitary Confinement. His next appointment with this third Psychiatrist was on September 26, 2011.

Your Honor, it was already about a month that he was under the medication. We started to notice positive changes in his behaviors. I am a Red Sox fan, so are my two sons. It was September 2011, and all Red Sox fans remember how painful it was to watch Red Sox slide from first place in the beginning of the month, to the almost last place at the end of the month. Every evening, I was still watching each game and feeling total agony and despair. However, in the mist of all the agony and despair, I had a surprise company. Rezwan started to sit with me and silently, watch the game. This had not happened in previous couple of years. I could see his expression of agony with every misstep by the Red Sox. I was full of joy. I could not stop thinking, what an irony of life. My wife was very happy too. We also noticed that Rezwan was no longer reacting angrily, when his brother entered the room. He just stayed quietly where he was. This was undoubtedly the most positive development, which brought so much calmness inside our house. In the meantime, Rezwan turned 26 on September 19, 2011.

On Sunday, September 25, 2011, my wife was going to visit her mother’s (Rezwan’s Nana) home located in Scituate, MA.  Rezwan’s Nana passed away in 2003. One of my wife’s younger sisters now lives there with her daughters, who are few years younger than Rezwan.  Rezwan told his mother he wants to come along. This was quite a surprise, because he had not visited his Nana’s house since August 2007, when he attended the High School graduation party of one of his cousin’s sister. Since 2008, when he broke up with his girlfriend, he had stopped looking at young girls, specially, at their eyes. This was due to his confused religious belief, accentuated by his mental illness, that a Muslim man was not supposed to look at marriage age girls unless married. I used to tell him, “I am Muslim, your brother is Muslim, entire my side of the family are Muslim, none of us do this. Why you have to do this?” Another reason was the presence of alcoholic beverages, which Muslims are forbidden to consume. My wife’s family is Catholic; therefore, presence of alcoholic beverages was quite common. These are the reasons he stopped visiting his Nana’s house, which he loved so much until August 2007. Therefore, when he said he wants to accompany his mother to his Nana’s house, we were very happy. To us this was a confirmation that his medication was working. Slowly, he was returning to old Rezwan that we knew. He went to his Nana’s house on September 25, 2011, with his mother and they came back after midnight, almost after twelve hours. I was waiting anxiously and as soon as they came back, I asked his mother quietly, “how did he behave? Did he mix with his cousin sisters?” My wife was excited with joy. She told me it was just like before. He sat with them, talked, and played with them in the yard. He had a great time and so did his cousin sisters.

In the afternoon of September 26, 2011, I drove Rezwan to his appointment with the third psychiatrist again. The session lasted about 45 minutes. After the session, Rezwan seemed satisfied. He showed me the next appointment card, which was on October 25, 2011. I asked him, “I know it is private between you and your doctor, but, if you don’t mind giving some hint about the kind of stuffs you discussed?”

He told me they talked about different things; they talked about jobs that would be good for him. He (doctor) thinks going back to tutoring would be a good start for him. I agreed, “Sounds a good idea.”

(According to affidavit, September 20, Rezwan made a training video ‘how to make cell phone detonators’ filmed by one of the UCE and gave 1 more phone detonation device to UCE2. This important paragraph numbered 80, has only five lines of text. Do you think it was not a crime to make a video in front of the UCE? If it was a crime, why was he not arrested at that time? Do you think they were trying to pile up charges against him to make the story more shocking?)

THE ILL-FATED DAY:

Your Honor, Wednesday, September 28, 2011, was the most dreadful and ill-fated day in our family’s life. It started out nice. A bright fall day. After breakfast, around 9:00AM, Rezwan asked me if I could drop him in the Ashland Public Library. I asked him “why so early?” He told me that he was reading a book on Psychology and wants to finish it. Lately, he had read literature on OCD that I gave him and showed more interest on the subject. In our family, visiting library is always a good thing. Since I used to drive him to the library by myself, it was never in my imagination that something bad could happen to him, while in the library. How naive was I? On the way to library, he voluntarily told me that he was thinking about the suggestions his Psychiatrist had given him, on September 26, 2011, about the kind of jobs he could do. He told me starting from next Monday he was going to start calling some of the old Tutoring Agencies. I told him whatever he felt comfortable with. It was a short ride. Who knew, this could be our last drive together ever. Only God will have the final say on this. On this very day, I also had to drop Farhad to his work, around 12noon. After 1:00PM, I decided to make myself a sandwich for lunch, took some stuff out of the refrigerator, and placed them on the kitchen counter. Right at that moment, our dog Ziggy started to bark frantically, near the front door of the house. I went to check. Front door was already open, but storm door was locked. I used to keep the front door open to let the sun light come in. I saw two professional looking men, right out side the door, on the front step. I opened the storm door and immediately they flashed their badges and said “FBI”. I was taken aback totally, but nonetheless, let them come in. One of them said, “Your son Rezwan, we have arrested him.” With a loud panicky voice, I said “what for?” Same person said “terrorism charges.” I said loudly “o’ my God, is he hurt.” They said “no.” I said “when did this happen. I left him in the library after 9:00AM.” They said something like 11:00AM, but I am not sure now. They kind of lead me towards the kitchen and kept saying “are you ok? Are you ok?” in the kitchen, they pointed me towards a chair in the kitchen table and said, “Please sit down.” I sat down. One of the agents sat on the next chair, on my right, and the other was standing by the kitchen table. The agent sitting next to me on the chair gave me his business card and said, “I am the lead agent.” At that point, I was weeping and put my head on the table and kept saying “o’ Rezwan, o’ Rezwan.” Lead agent kept telling me “are you feeling ok? Are you feeling ok? We have ambulance here. If you are feeling any discomfort we can take you to the hospital.” I said, “Give me some time”. I got the feeling that they were well aware of my heart condition. I gathered myself, raised my head, sat straight, and said, “You know, he is not well mentally, he is wearing diapers.” They kept quite. I then asked, “What you guys going to do now?” Lead agent said, they had a warrant to search Rezwan’s bedroom and the basement only. He told me “call your wife, both of you need to go to the Worcester Federal Court. Rezwan is going to be arraigned there at 3:00PM.” I looked at my watch. It was already about 1:50PM. I called my wife in her cell phone at her work. First couple of times she did not pick up the phone. I called again and she picked up the phone. I said “Ana, don’t panic, please come home right now.” She started screaming, “What happened? What happened? Is it something to do with Rezwan?” I said, “Yes, please come home and drive slowly.” I did not tell her that FBI arrested Rezwan, because I wanted her to come home safely. At this point, I still did not know what was going on outside our house. I told the lead agent “she is coming.” He told me if I could show them the Rezwan’s bedroom and the basement. I told the lead agent his room was upstairs and started walking towards the foyer. Both agents were following me. When I came to foyer to take the stairs, which was right near the front door, I noticed few other people, some standing in the foyer, some were outside the front door, and also saw a white van and couple of other white SUVs on the street. I asked the lead agent “are you guys going to have too many cars and people? This is a quite neighborhood.” He told me “I will tell them not to bring too many cars.” At that point, he called somebody in his cell phone and said something to that effect. Upstairs, I showed them Rezwan’s room. All three of us entered the room. One of them opened the closet door. I saw half-used diaper box on the closet floor. I said, “See these are the diapers he is using.” They did not say anything. We came downstairs again and then went to basement. They gave a quick look in the basement. Lead agent told me “let’s go upstairs. I hope your wife is here. You guys need to go to the court before 3:00PM.” We came back to the kitchen and looked at my watch. It was about 2:25PM. Lead agent pointed at my Laptop, sitting on its stand, and asked, “Who’s that?” I said, “It is mine.” Right at that moment, my wife entered in the kitchen corridor through the garage entrance. She was in total panic, almost collapsing. I hugged her and told her “FBI has arrested Rezwan.” Lead agent kept rushing us by saying, “You need to go to the court. You will be late.” I asked him “how do we know what you are taking?” He told me that, he would leave a list of everything that they were taking, on the kitchen table.  I told the lead agent, “for God’s sake, please do not do anything that you will not do to your son or house.” The thought came to me that, they might say, they had found something in Rezwan’s room or in the basement, when they did not. I then held my wife and walked with her to the garage, to get in to my car. That was when I realized, our driveway, our lawn, and street in front of our house, were full of cars, vans, trucks, and people. As I was driving, down the driveway, and in our street, I could hear the hovering sound above us. I told my wife “I think they have got helicopters too.” I did not see any reporters yet. On the way to Worcester Federal Court, I called Farhad, who was at work, on his cell phone. Fist I told him “do not panic” then I told him the tragedy. I told him we are on our way to Worcester Federal Court, where Rezwan was going to be arraigned, and told him not to come home after the work, instead, to go to one of his friend’s house. I then called my younger brother, an engineer, at his work. I told him briefly the incident and that we were on our way to Worcester Federal Court. He told me he was immediately leaving the work and going to his home. He told me to go to his house directly after the court. Rest of the way to court, both my wife and I were weeping, comforting each other, expressing our grief for Rezwan, and kept repeating, “He was so sick. He was getting better. He was seeing Psychiatrist. God, please keep him safe.” I turned on the radio and they were just telling the story repeatedly, towing the government line.  My wife said, “Please turned off the radio. I can’t take the lies anymore.” I turned off the radio and kept driving. I looked at the traffic state ahead of me, on Route 9, but all I could see was Rezwan’s face, the moment, when he was getting of my car this morning, when I drove him to the Ashland Public Library. I have never felt so helpless. It was a cold sinking feeling that made everything meaningless.

By the time, we entered the 5th floor court room of Judge Hillman, it was already after 3:20PM, Rezwan was in the court standing by his court appointed lawyer. Judge set the detention hearing date on October 3, 2011. Court proceedings were over in few minutes, after we had arrived. Rezwan was still wearing the same shirt that he had on that morning; an off-white long sleeve shirt. He looked very skinny and exhausted. Seeing him like that, we just could not stop sobbing. I did not know if he had seen or hard us, or not. I wanted him to know that we were there. Soon, the session was over, the Marshalls put the handcuffs on Rezwan, and proceeded to take him out of the courtroom. Both of us called up his name “Rezwan. We love you.” On his way out, he saw us and raised his head to acknowledge. We said, “Stay strong. God will be with you.” We came out of the courtroom. His attorney came to us and introduced herself “Catherine Byrne”, and we introduced ourselves to her. She led us to a small consultation room, where we exchanged necessary information, and obtained a copy of the affidavit from her. We came down to courthouse lobby. An elderly security guard was very kind to us. He told us that Rezwan was taken to ‘Wyatt Detention Center’ in Central Falls, RI. We should call there tomorrow to find out how we can visit. He was kind enough to let us go out through the back door, in order to avoid encountering any reporter.

From the car, my wife called one of our neighbor friends, who lived in a street near ours, to go and check on our house. She told her that they already did, and was trying to reach us, and told us not to come home now, because, it were swarmed with reporters. My wife told her we were out of the court and going to my brother’s house now. I called Farhad; he told me he was in one of his friend’s house now. He told me, after I called him on the way to court, his friend came to pick him up, and he went to our house to see for himself. He told me agents were following him everywhere. He went to his room, an agent followed him into his room, and he picked up some stuff from his room, and left the house with his friend. I told him not to come home until we returned from his uncle’s house, stay safe and eat some food. I asked him about our dog Ziggy. He told me he could not take him with him and they (agents) kept him in the sunroom. I then called my brother and he said they were waiting for us. It was already dark when we reached my brother’s house. He already had recorded some TV reporting on Rezwan. We watched, and could see TV trucks and vans, full of reporters, swarming our house from the street. We could see couple of police car on our driveway, but the house was dark.  Most of the stations broadcasting the news repeatedly, towing the government line how U.S. district Attorney said, “public was never in danger”, now a ‘cliché’ on Americas ‘war on terror’. 

Your Honor, I could not help but include the following quote from the article titled ‘Whatever Happened to that Iranian Bomb Plot Case?’ By Michael Kaufman and published in Counter Punch on October 10, 2011.  “Terrorism cases have appeared to divide into two distinct categories so far. For myself, I start from a general rule that whenever a public official proclaims that “the public was never in danger”, I take that to mean that the public was never in danger, that is to say, it was a case of entrapment. The cases our various security agencies have broken have generally been those which they designed, funded, recruited and directed themselves. The cliché that comes to mind is playing tennis without a net…or a ball…or an opponent.”

“Then there are those legitimate cases, such as the Abdulmutallab plot, the Richard Read shoe-bombing attempt, or the incident in Times Square, when the public indeed was in danger. None of these cases, incidentally, was prevented by the FBI or Homeland Security or other agencies but failed through malfunction, lack of execution and the intervention of private citizens.”

We had some food. My brother insisted that we stay for the night in his house. We were adamant to come back to our house, and face it whatever it was. We left my brother’s house after 9:00PM. We approached the house on our street from the west so that reporters would not be able to take any pictures, because of our car headlights. Tactics worked, before the reporters realized whose car it was, we entered our driveway. Two Ashland police car was sitting on our driveway. They stopped us. When they found us who we were, they quickly let us get into our garage. They also told us they were here for our safety, and the reporters were not allowed to enter in our property. I closed the garage door, before even got off from the car. Outside of the house was lighted up with the bright flood light by the news media. Even though there were no lights inside the house, when we entered, it was quite bright because of the flood light. Immediately, we made sure all the window blinds were down. Still quite a bit of lights was coming inside through our open window in the foyer. It was extremely annoying and stressful. We could not believe that news media could be so inconsiderate. We turned couple of recess lights on, in the kitchen. Suddenly I realized that our dog Ziggy was not around with his welcoming running around. I immediately started calling for Ziggy and he responded from the dark sunroom in the back of the house. I opened the sliding door to sunroom and he came running and sat near my feet almost on top and kept raising his head every few seconds to give a look at me, as if to assure me, he was here and not to worry. It really gave me a lot of comfort. I petted him and gave him some food. I thought, it must have been very stressful for him too. I noticed that couple of pages of hand written text on our kitchen table. I picked up the pages, went under the lights, and realized, it was the list of items that were taken from Rezwan’s room and basement. None of us were in a state of mind to read the pages, so I put them back on the table. I called Farhad and told him that we are home, he could come now, and told him the trick we did to avoid the reporters. In the telephone answering machine, message light was flashing, somewhere around 30 messages. Most of the messages were from concerned family and friends, few from news media wanted to talk to us. Then one message was chilling. It threatened our life. My wife called the Ashland police station and they directed one of the officers, sitting in the police car, in our driveway, to come to our house. After the officer came inside the house and listen the message, he called back the station, and few minutes later, a detective arrived. He listen the message first, then made a recording of it, and told us to change the telephone number immediately. I called our telephone company and changed our current phone number, which we had for more than 26 years, to a new unpublished number. This was when Farhad entered through the back door. We cried and hugged each other. We asked him, if he was ok, and he said he was. Just then, some of my wife’s family, sisters and nieces, came to spend some time with us. We went through one more round of emotional moments. We asked the police officers, if they could stop the flood light on our house, who also advised us not to talk to media at all. Finally, at midnight flood light turned off by the media. My wife’s family left around 2:00AM. I realized, I must lie down for a while. I had serious heart problems. It was 05:00AM in the morning, and the house was suddenly flooded with lights again. Realized it was news time, and hence the reason for flood light on our house. It was extremely stressful. News media stayed in front of our house for next 3 to 4 days. We did not talk to them at all under the advice from the Ashland police and from the Rezwan’s attorneys.

DAYS OF DISPAIR AND GRATITUDE:

Your Honor, next few days were the most painful for our family. My family was devastated in this highly publicized arrest. We are grasping for some positive reinforcement, while facing the constant negative (most of them are lies or twisted) media (local, national, and international). Immediately after Rezwan’s arrest, many articles, written about Rezwan, started to appear, mostly in the non-mainstream news media. These articles were like a ‘life boat’ to our family, and encouraged us to gather our strength, paddle ashore, and fight back. I like to list some of those articles that lifted us and gave us hope:

1. FBI faces entrapment questions over Rezwan Ferdaus bomb plot arrest
2. The War on Terror Hoax
3. Why Should We Trust the FBI?
4. Is the FBI Busting Its Own Conspiracies
5. The FBI again thwarts its own Terror plot
6. Terrorist Plot, Or Homeland Security Theater
7. FBI intercepts its own terrorist plot against US Capitol, Pentagon
8. Entrapping Muslims in America
9. Terrorist Plots, Hatched by the F.B.I
10. New Evidence of Anti-Islam Bias Underscores Deep Challenges for FBI’s Reform Pledge
11. FBI Teaches Agents: ‘Mainstream’ Muslims Are ‘Violent, Radical'
12. Videos
• False Flag/ Psy-Op’s
• Home Grown Terrorist or FBI Special Projects?
• FBI and Islamophobia

Your Honor, we could withstand the relentless pressure from the news media. However, not knowing the conditions, Rezwan was subjected to, caused us the most agony. Our major concern was his medication. We know that, he must continue to take his medication. We were frantically trying to figure out, how we can visit Rezwan, in the Detention Center. Finally, my wife and I were able to visit him for the first time, on Friday, September 30, 2011. Farhad did not go with us on first day, because we were not sure, how Rezwan would react. We saw him in the evening, in a video setup. In addition to viewing live pictures of each other, we could also converse on a telephone, one at a time. Meeting was highly emotional. Seeing him in a yellow jump suit and shackled, was unbearable. First few minutes, no matter how much we tried to control our emotion, all three of us, could not stop crying. After we were able to calm down, we asked him, how he was doing, how was his health, did he eat, etc. He told us that, he was ok and he had food. His bladder control was similar to what he had a week ago, but he had a toilet in the cell, so, it was not that bad. Best news he gave us was, he started to receive his medication from Friday morning, under the request from his attorneys. We were relieved to hear that he was taking medication. He told us, it was the same medication, which he was taking at home. We reminded him, repeatedly, not to forget, to take the medication. We know that, as long as, he continues on his medication, he would be able to think more clearly, and withstand the stress that he was under. We know, Rezwan has a strong mind. Our visiting time was up. His mother told him, “Fahi (Farhad) is going to visit you on Sunday.” He just calmly said, “ok.” I told him, “Stay strong. God will be with you.” He told us “take care of you.”  We hang up the phone and video screen went black. His mother and I felt quite at ease, after seeing and talking to him, even though it was over video screen. We thought he was quite calm under the pressure. We thought it was a good sign, when he reacted very calmly, when his mother told him about his brother’s visit.

We went to visit him again, on Sunday afternoon. This time Farhad came along. We were somewhat tense, thinking, how Rezwan would react to his brother.  After Rezwan came to video, Farhad waved him, and Rezwan waved back. First couple of minutes, my wife and I, talked to Rezwan. We asked him about his health, breakfast, and lunch, etc. We asked him, if had taken the medication, and he said, he did. Since every conversation on the phone was recorded, we could not ask, many of the other questions that we had in our mind, like his legal affairs. We told him “why don’t you talk to Fahi now.” He calmly said, “ok”. We handed over the phone to Fahi. I was thinking, moment of truth had arrived. Fahi asked how Rezwan was doing. Rezwan seemed to reply. We could not hear the voice, because they were talking on the phone. But, we could see Rezwan’s expression on the video, which was calm and pleasant, almost, he was glad that Fahi was there. We could sense the emotion and little tears, on both of their eyes. But, to our pleasant surprise, we saw, they were talking fluently with each other, and even both of them laughed. It was a magical moment. My wife and I, silently watched their conversations, and could not hold back our tears. I said “thank you God.” Then they kept talking for the entire hour. One point, my wife took the phone from Fahi, and told Rezwan, “I was waiting for this moment for a long time.” Rezwan replied to her “I know.” My wife and I were overwhelmed with joy. I told her “God has his plan.” Visiting time was up. Fahi said goodbye to Rez, then I said to Rez “be strong, keep faith in God, I love you very much, we will be always there for you.” He replied, “I love you too.” I then reminded him that, all of us would be in the court tomorrow for his detention hearing. His mother told him “our love for you is unwavering. Do not forget to take medication. You have a large family. They always pray for you and supports you. Your ‘nana’ is looking after you from heaven, your ‘dadu-moni’ is praying for you 24/7.” Both Rezwan and Farhad call their grandmother (my mother) ‘dadu-moni’. We waved him goodbye and he waved back. Video screen went dark. We left with a heavy, but a thankful heart. Thankful to God, that, He had reconciled Fahi and Rez. Fahi told me in the car, “Dad it was like a magic. As if last two years does not exists in his mind.” Fahi told us “I will never abundant my brother.” His mother replied, “We know.”

DETENTION HEARING:

Your Honor, Rezwan’s Detention Hearings were conducted on October 3, November 4, and November 14, 2011. Here is a clip that I found in the web about October 3, Detention Hearing, ‘Rezwan Ferdaus Trial Update: What My Eyes Heard – Detention Hearing 3 October.’

After the bail hearing on November 4, 2011, Associated Press Reported: “A lawyer for a man accused of plotting to fly explosives-packed remote-controlled planes into the Pentagon and the U.S. Capitol suggested Friday that the FBI ignored signs of mental illness while investigating him.During cross-examination by Ferdaus' lawyer, Miriam Conrad, Davis (FBI Special Agent Bradley Davis) acknowledgedthat Ferdaus told the undercover employees he was anxious and depressed and was having "intrusive thoughts" in the month before his arrest. He also acknowledged that the FBI had received during the investigation reports about bizarre behavior by Ferdaus, including a report to Hopkinton police in February that he was standing in the road not moving and appeared to have wet his pants. Conrad asked Davis whether those reports "gave the FBI concern about the mental health of the target." "It's a consideration, but it's not a concern," Davis said. "Our concern was for public safety." Davis added, "Even individuals with mental health issues are a danger and a threat to the public."

DAYS OF SOLITARY CONFINEMENT:

Your Honor, since his arrest, on September 28, 2011, Rezwan is under Solitary Confinement, locked up in a cell, not much bigger than a standard walking closet, in a house. He is in Solitary Confinement, 23 out of 24 hours a day. Monday through Friday of the week, he is allowed to have, ‘recreation (rec)’ time, in a cage, while shackled. It is almost 13 months now, he is in Solitary Confinement. Solitary confinement deemed as a Human Rights Violation by the United Nations Human Rights Commission (HRC) and United States Human Rights Watch (USHRW). Even the United States Senators Finally Ponder the Question whether Solitary Confinement is Wrong in a meeting of the Senate Judiciary Committee Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Human Rights, convened by subcommittee chairman Dick Durbin on June 19, 2012. I like to use few quotes from former Iran Captive in Solitary Confinement, Sarah Shourd, published in the article, Former Iran Captive Denounces Solitary Confinement in America; “I had really extreme panic attacks and lost control of myself, screaming or beating at the walls. I wouldn't even know that I was the one who was screaming." “I think it is important for people in solitary to realize how brave they are and what incredible strength and coping mechanisms it takes to go through anything like this.” "It's torture. It's inhumane. It's degrading. and anyone who experiences this treatment will suffer the consequences and will have to heal. But one of the things that helped me, in solitary for over a year without trial or charges, was the belief I could get through it. And people who have spent so many decades in prison, their survival is testimony to all of humanity and to the strength and resilience of all of us. It should be proscribed by the UN. And the US, as the worst violator, should take a leading role in eradicating solitary confinement."

Your Honor, as a family, we are determined to keep Rezwan sane, while he is in Solitary Confinement. We are allowed to visit him 3 days a week, either, Sunday, Monday, Friday, or Saturday. As a family, we have chosen to visit Rezwan, every Friday, Saturday, and Sunday of the week. These are 1 hour, at a time visit. He is allowed to have a 20 minutes phone call on Tuesday of the week. Since his arrest on September 28, 2011, my wife and I had visited Rezwan, every Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, without exceptions. Farhad had visited Rezwan Every Saturday or Sunday without exceptions. Some time we had visited him on Mondays also, when for whatever reason, we missed a Friday. Most of his extended family had visited him at least few times since his arrest. Some of his young cousins (boys and girls), visited him quite frequently. Rezwan loves to spend time with his cousins. Many of his long lost friends visited him also. Rezwan loves the time he spends with the visitors, specially, from the young cousins and friends. They talk about the olden days, sports, and current affairs, which interest young minds. Rezwan laughs with his friends and cousins, his big brown eyes are dancing again, just like the way he was. It gives us a lot of joy.  As a family, we are determined to avail every opportunity, to spend time with Rezwan. He also, tries his best to keep his sanity there. Many of the prison guards have confided to us, Rezwan is very well behaved and polite, and they love to talk to Rezwan. He reads many books, which he obtains from ‘book cart’ inside the detention center. Here is a list of some of the books, which he read from the ‘book cart’:

1. ‘Tau Zero’, by Poul Anderson
2. ‘Forward the Foundations’, by Isaac Asimov
3. ‘Native Son’, by Richard Wright
4. ‘Lusitania: An Epic Tragedy’, by Diana Preston
5. ‘Islands and the Streams’, by Ernest Hemingway
6. ‘Uncle Vanya’, by Anton Chekhov
7. ‘Heart of Darkness’, by Joseph Conrad
8. ‘Crossing to Safety’, by Wallace Stegner
9. ‘War and Peace’, by Leo Tolstoy

On Rezwan’s request, I had sent him following books:

1. ‘What Is Mathematics? An Elementary Approach to Ideas and Methods’, by Richard Courant, Herbert Robbins, Ian Stewart
2. ‘A Tale of Two Cities’, by Charles Dickens
3. ‘The Count of Monte Christo’, by Alexandre Dumas
4. ‘Les Miserables’, by Victor Hugo
5.  ‘The Arabian Nights: Tales of 1,001 Night: Volume 1’, by Anonymous, Robert Irwin, Malcolm C. Lyons, Ursula Lyons
6. ‘A History of Mathematics’, by Carl B. Boyer, Uta C. Merzbach
7. ‘Mosaic Techniques & Traditions: Projects & Design from Around the World’, by Sonia King
8. ‘Mosaic Art and Style: Designs for Living Environments’, by JoAnn Loktov
9. ‘What Men Live By and Other Tales:’, by Leo Tolstoy
10. ‘Astronomy: A Self-Teaching Guides’, by Dinah L. Moche
11. ‘The Koran: With Parallel Arabic Text’, by Anonymous, N. J. Dawood

Malus ‘Donald Wyman’ – Flowering Crab

Planted on October 09, 2012

Rezwan wanted his family to plant a tree on his behalf in his parents house. He wanted a tree that is native to New England, has white blossoms in spring, and gives fruits in Fall and Winter for the birds and little animals to enjoy.

This tree satisfied all the Rezwan's requirements.

FEW QUESTIONS THAT MUST BE ASKED:

According to affidavit, CW introduced Rezwan to two UCE’s on March 9, 2011. After that, UCE’s met Rezwan on following dates of 2011: March 28 (Monday), March 29 (Tuesday), April 18  (Monday), April 19 (Tuesday) - UCE’s gave money to purchase plane ticket to travel to Washington, D.C. on May 13, 2011, May 3 (Tuesday), May 5 (Thursday ) – gave UCE1 a thumb drive containing attack plan and demonstrated mobile phone detonation device, May 13 (Friday) - went to D.C. and came back on May 15, 2011, June 9 (Thursday) – delivered extended plan on thumb drive in a hotel room Also gave cell phone detonation device, June 15 (Wednesday), June 17 (Friday) – got $450.00 to rent storage which he did on the same day, June 27 (Monday) - gave second cell phone detonation device and key of the storage, July 21 (Thursday) - received $4000.00 cash for plane and placed order, August 1 (Monday) – delivered 3 more phone detonation device, August 2 (Tuesday) - received another $3500.00 cash for plane, August 24 (Wednesday) - delivered 2 more phone detonation device), September 20 (Tuesday) - made training video filmed by UCEs and gave 1 more phone detonation device), September 28 (Wednesday) - received C4, grenades, AK47s from UCEs. “Before delivering them to FERDAUS, the UCEs allowed FERDAUS to inspect them. After inspecting the components, FERDAUS brought them to his storage unit. After FERDAUS took possession of the explosives and firearms and locked them in his storage unit, FERDAUS was arrested.” Since Rezwan had no car and no money, he had to be picked up by the UCEs, either from our house or somewhere nearby, i.e. walking distance from the house, some of these days it had to be after I dropped him, at the Ashland Public Library. All these meetings were conducted in a place of UCEs choice, under a set environment, designed to manipulate young mind, especially, this was a ‘piece of cake’ for FBI when the target was a mentally ill person.

Rezwan had very visible symptoms of OCD, a man who had no choice but to subject him to the demeaning act of wearing diapers, so that he would not wet himself. Specially, months of July, August, and September of 2011, when Rezwan was shaking violently and having intrusive thoughts even acknowledged by the FBI “During cross-examination by Ferdaus' lawyer, Miriam Conrad, Davis (FBI Special Agent Bradley Davis) acknowledged that Ferdaus told the undercover employees he was anxious and depressed and was having "intrusive thoughts" in the month before his arrest. Conrad asked Davis whether those reports "gave the FBI concern about the mental health of the target." "It's a consideration, but it's not a concern," Davis said. "Our concern was for public safety." Davis added, "Even individuals with mental health issues are a danger and a threat to the public.” Given the above context, following questions desired to be answered:

1.      Do you think, it is a standard or acceptable practice or within the realm of law for the FBI, to lead such a person through a sophisticated and  multistage sting operation, knowing fully that there was no real threat, nothing was ever going to happen?

2.      What did Rezwan do before October 21, 2010, that it warranted an aggressive pursuit of him, which accounted to nothing but a case of manufactured terrorism?

3.      Do you think without the aggressive involvement of CW and UCEs, and the FBI financing, Rezwan would have done anything or capable of doing anything?

4.      Throughout 2011, CW and UCEs, lead on Rezwan, from one act to another, treating him like an experimental laboratory rat, with the full knowledge of his mental illness. Do you think following questions are valid? :

a.      According to affidavit, on May 5, 2011, Rezwan gave an electronic copy of his plan to UCE1. He also gave UCE1 a mobile phone detonation device. Why did they not arrest him then?  Do you think it was not a criminal offense?

b.      According to affidavit, on June 9, 2011, UCE1 drove him to a hotel in Framingham and met with UCE2, where he delivered the extended attack plan on a thumb drive to UCEs. He gave a cell phone detonation device on that day also. Why did they not arrest him then?  Do you think it was not a criminal offence?

c.       According to affidavit, on July 21, 2011, “UCE1 gave $4000.00 in cash to place the order for the F-86 Sabre, which  FERDAUS in turn deposited into his bank account” and on August 2, “UCEs provided FERDAUS with $3500.00 to pay for remaining balance on the F-86”. Why did they not arrest him then? Do you think receiving money from UCEs was not a criminal offence?

d.      According to affidavit, on August 24, Rezwan delivered 2 more phone detonation device to UCE’s. Why did they not arrest him then?  Do you think it was not a criminal offence?

e.      According to affidavit, September 20, Rezwan made a training video ‘how to make cell phone detonators’ filmed by one of the UCE and gave 1 more phone detonation device to UCE2. Do you think it was not a crime to make a video in front of the UCE? If it was a crime, why was he not arrested at that time?

In the context of a. through e. above, do you think they were trying to pile up charges against him, to make the story more shocking? At the same time, slap Rezwan, with unbelievable number of years, e.g. 100 years, of potential prison terms, so that, he would not have any other choice, but to accept a plea deal, thereby, enabling the prosecutors, to announce “it is a victory for the government” with much fanfare.

5. According to affidavit, August 31, 2011, Rezwan moved the packages containing F-86 remote control plane to storage device. After a month later, when he was arrested, on September 28, 2011, a picture of a remote controlled plane sitting on a picnic table, what looks like somebody’s backyard, was released to the news media. People all over the world thought it was Rezwan,s plane. We know for sure now that, it was not Rezwan’s plane. In this context, following questions come to mind:
1. Why did FBI not use the actual plane for the publicity, even though, Rezwan obtain the plane, almost a month ago? Is that because, Rezwan’s plane was not impressive enough, for the claim, that FBI was making?
2. Or, FBI had already prepared for the publicity months ahead, because they knew, how the play was going to end. After all, this was a multi-act play, written, produced, and directed by the FBI, to achieve a maximum bang, for the desired publicity. When the ‘convenient’ time to go public arrived, they just went ahead with their already collected publicity materials, with the full knowledge that, mainstream media would just tow their lines, anyway.

6. Rezwan was under Psychiatric care and was already under medication for almost a month and a half, before his arrest on September 28, 2011. He was making noticeable progress in his mental health at that time, which I have described in the section ‘REZWAN ENTER’S A NEW PHASE AND ACKNOWLEDGED HIS ILLNESS’. It is our view that, once the FBI found out his mental health was improving, he was spending more time with us, thereby, ran the risk of Rezwan’s opening up to us,  which made the FBI to accelerate the process of going public. Do you disagree with our view? 

WHY REZWAN DID PLEAD GUILTY TO TWO COUNTS?

Your Honor, on July 20th; Rezwan stood before you in this court room and accepted a plea deal to plead guilty to two of the six original charges for a very long sentence of 17 years. These two charges had a potential of 35 years of combined prison terms. The government dropped 4 charges that had a potential of 65 years combined prison terms. Rezwan was given only couple of hours to accept the plea deal. Sitting in the solitary confinement, already for 9 months and no end in sight, Rezwan had to decide for his entire future, in these couple of hours. Solitary confinement deemed as a Human Rights Violation by the United Nations Human Rights Commission (HRC) and United States Human Rights Watch (USHRW). Even the United States Senators Finally Ponder the Question whether Solitary Confinement is Wrong in a meeting of the Senate Judiciary Committee Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Human Rights, convened by subcommittee chairman Dick Durbin on June 19, 2012. Only God knows what went through Rezwan’s young mind when he agreed to accept the plea deal in just couple of hours.

Your Honor, this American family understands, and any other American of reasonable conscience understands, given the current climate of rampant Islamophobia, what other choice Rezwan had? Do you think, being a Muslim American, would he have received a fair trial? Do you think, jurors of his peers would have judged him? American history since 9/11 including the most recent case involving a Muslim American that unfolded in this Court House just a year ago tells us all we need to know. Even the mainstream media like The New York Times Editorial Page Editor’s Blog on March 30, 2012, recognized this fact.    

Your Honor, on the same day that Rezwan stood before you, in this court room, and accepted a plea deal, a horrific tragedy, an unspeakable act of terror, unfolded hours before at the movie theater in Aurora, Colorado, and shocked and terrified the Americans all over the country. Mainstream media and law enforcement community refused to call it terrorism, instead gave excuses why it is not. Given, what we know now, about the perpetrator of this horrific tragedy, James Holmes, a graduate student, under psychiatric care, and reported to police by his own doctor as may be a danger to community, who has purchased many automatic assault weapons and 6000 rounds of ammunitions over a period of few months. All on his own and not financed and not delivered by the FBI. Most Americans of reasons understand what was stopping them calling it terrorism and why he was not in the FBI’s radar. Now, for the sake of understanding, lets just change the name from ‘James Holmes’ to ‘Mohammed Halim’ and visualize the hysteria that unfolds among the mainstream media. When he would have been arrested, even though most likelihood is that he was already under surveillance, as most Muslim students are all over the country, which is highlighted by the Associated Press (AP) investigative report on NYPD surveillance of Muslim students. Also, by all likelihood, all his automatic weapons and ammunitions purchases are financed and delivered to him by the FBI under an elaborate entrapment scheme. When this ‘Mohammed Halim’ would have been arrested at the FBI’s ‘convenience’ under the maximum media blitz, a statement of sort “public was never in danger” probably be given by the appropriate authority. Your Honor, I apologize for bringing up this horrific tragedy and opening up the wounds once again for so many Americans that happened on the same day that, Rezwan pleaded guilty to two of the six original charges. But we are not the only one that could not help but drawing the above comparison, even the Boston’s NPR news station broadcast “Comparing ‘Lone Wolves’: Holmes and Ferdaus” on July 20, 2012, found the comparison disturbing.

Your Honor, if anybody has any doubt what I am talking about here, let’s have a reality check. On Saturday, September 15, 2012, couple of days after I wrote the above comparison, we went to visit Rezwan in the detention center just like every Saturday since his arrest. After we were back home, feeling depressed and helpless, I sat down to watch 6:30 Nightly News on NBC with Lester Holt, just like most Saturdays, who opened the news with the following broadcast (watch video):

Lester Holt: “Good evening. On what has already been a week of high anxiety for the country with the 9/11 anniversary and anti-American violence over seas there is late word tonight the FBI has exposed an apparent homegrown terror plot in Chicago involving an American teenager. The feds arresting an 18-year-old man who they say tried to detonate a car bomb outside a Chicago bar. What he apparently did not know was that the FBI was in on it from the start and the bomb was a fake. NBC's John Yang is in our Chicago newsroom with more. Was anyone put at risk here?”

John Yang: “law enforcement officials stressed to NBC news that no one was ever at risk. The bomb was a phony. The suspect, 18-year-old Adel Daud had no weapons training and is not a member or connected with any terrorist group -- international terrorist group. According to this 35-page criminal complaint he was spotted by the FBI online talking jihad and talking about attacking Americans. An undercover FBI agent got in touch with him. In the course of their discussions he came up with this plot to attack a target in Chicago and last night, according to the FBI, he was given a phony bomb, drove it in a jeep Cherokee to a bar in downtown Chicago, parked it outside, walked away and tried to detonate it. Once he did he was arrested by the FBI. He is now in custody. He had a brief appearance before a magistrate today. He'll be back in federal court on Monday. Law enforcement officials tell NBC news he's a misguided, angry 18-year-old. Lester?”

As soon as I hard the news, I started calling my wife who was upstairs by screaming “They did it again…They did it again…” My wife came down and asked, “who did it again?” I said, “FBI manufactured another terror plot in Chicago, this time using a teenager, similar to Rez.” I let my wife listen to the broadcast video on the web and after listening all she could say “Oh my God….Oh my God…I wonder how his parents are feeling?” Does this broadcast sound familiar? “FBI was in on it from the start and the bomb was a fake”, “law enforcement officials stressed to NBC news that no one was ever at risk”. Then why “last night, according to the FBI, he was given a phony bomb”? What it is that made “last night” convenient for the FBI? Could it be that, “On what has already been a week of high anxiety for the country with the 9/11 anniversary and anti-American violence overseas”, committed by the Muslims? Do you still think my description of the scenario involving fictitious character of ‘Mohammed Halim’ is far fetched? I wonder how it is plausible that they can isolate and pickup an 18 year old Muslim teenager from web surfing but has no clue when a non-Muslim graduate student with destructive mental illness reported to police, purchases many automatic weapons and 6000 rounds of ammunitions within a short period of time. To me, the fact that cases like ‘Rezwan’ and ‘Adel Daud’ and many others who are Muslims, did not escape FBI’s radar but ‘James Holmes’ did, is a shinning example of FBI’s Islamophobic priority. Your Honor, the fact that our truth seekers, ‘mainstream media’, stay away from critical scrutiny of law enforcement when it comes to non Muslims, amplifies the climate that exists in the US today against American Muslims under which Rezwan, may had to evaluate whether to accept the plea deal or go to trial.

Just two weeks after the ‘James Holmes’ incident; on the morning of August 5, 2012, tragedy strikes again in Oak Creek, Wisconsin. A lone gunman linked with “White Supremacist’ group entered a ‘Gurdwara’, a Sikh House of Worship of the local Sikh community and killed at least 7 Sikhs and wounded many more including a police officer. This time the local police quickly came out and said it was an act of domestic terrorism. The FBI agreed with the statement. But pundits in our mainstream media like CNN, over and over reminded us that “Sikhs are not Muslims”. An article published in ‘Counter Punch’, on August 6, 2012, by Vijay Prashad titled “The Sense of White Supremacy”, pointed out that “Sikhs are not Muslims”, “now clichéd, to make the case that this is violence at the wrong address. Sikhs did nothing wrong, they are peace-loving and so on. It assumes that there are people who did do something wrong, are war-mongering and therefore deserve to be targeted. The liberal gesture of innocence has within it the sharp edge of Islamaphobia. It seems to suggest that Muslims are the ones who should bear this violence, since their ilk did the attacks on 9/11 and they are, all two billion of them, at war with the United States.”  Your Honor, I apologize once again, for bringing up yet another horrific tragedy to underline the point that, even the so-called truth seekers, mainstream news media, of our society are knowingly or out of ignorance raising the anti Muslim sentiments. Where, if Rezwan had decided to go to trial, do you think, the jurors of his peers would have judged him?

Second week of September, 2012, we saw a series of violence committed against American Diplomats in Libya, Egypt, and Yemen, which resulted in tragic death of US Ambassador to Libya Christopher Stevens and three other Americans. We were saddened very much by this tragic loss of lives. The violence which had triggered by an unthinkable hateful movie against the religion of Islam, produced in US. Yet again, some non-Muslim in US tried to express their extreme freedom of expression by hateful message against Muslims and went un-scrutinized by the mainstream media until the violence took place. Now imagine if there was a hateful anti-Semitic movie or cartoon made by an American Muslim, as part of extreme freedom of expression. What would have been the reaction of the protector of our free speech, our mainstream media? The article 'America and the Muslims: The Reality Behind the “Free Speech” Argument' published in Counter Punch can be accessed by anyone to further understand what I am talking about. Here is a quote from China Daily, “On the surface, the anti-American attacks have been triggered by a 14-minute online trailer of a supposed US film that "defames Prophet Muhammad". But the root of the violence runs deeper as the amateurish video reflects the deep divide between the West and the Muslim world.”

“On Thursday, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton tried to distance the US government from the anti-Islamic film. Calling it "disgusting and reprehensible", Clinton emphasized that the US government has nothing to do with it. But there is no denying that the video was made in the US, and it is more than symbolic of how much the West discriminates against and even hates Muslims.”

Google refused to remove this hateful video against Islam from the YouTube on the grounds of freedom of speech. But Google had no problem removing the video which was the recitation of the poem “What Must Be Said” by German Noble Laureate Gunter Grass, under the pressure from Israel. If you click on the video, a message from YouTube said, “This video has been removed because its content violated YouTube’s Terms of Service.” Here are the last few lines of the poem:

“It’s time to demand free and permanent control
of BOTH Israel’s nuclear arsenal
AND Iran’s nuclear facilities
enforced with international supervision.

It’s the only way, in a land convulsed with insanity,
Israelis, Palestinians, everybody, will survive.
And we too, will survive.”

Your Honor, these are all real life experiences that highlights the anti-Muslim sentiments in the US, where, if Rezwan had decided to go to trial, do you think he would have received a fair trial?

WHY DID GOVERNMENT DROP FOUR CHARGES AGAINST REZWAN?

Your Honor, Rezwan was originally, charged with following six counts:

1. Attempting to damage and destroy a federal building, by means of an explosive, in violation of 18 USC 444(f). Carries a maximum sentence of 20 years and minimum of 5 years
2. Attempting to damage and destroy national defense premises, in violation of 18 USC 2155. Carries a maximum sentence of 20 years
3.  Receipt of explosive materials, in violation of 18 USC 844(d). Carries a maximum sentence of 20 years
4. Receipt and possession of non-registered firearms, in violation of 26 USC 5861(d).Carries a maximum sentence of 10 years
5. Attempting to provide material support to terrorists, in violation of 18 USC 2339A. Carries a maximum sentence of 15 years
6. Attempting to provide material support to a designated foreign terrorist organization, in violation of 18 USC 2339B. Carries a maximum sentence of 15 years

These six charges carry, 100 years of potential prison terms. On July 20, 2011, Rezwan pleads guilty to charges 1 and 5, before you, for a prison term of 17 years. Government dropped charges 2, 3, 4, and 6, which had a combined prison terms of 65 years. Do you think, it is logical to wonder, why would the government, dropped these 2/3 of the original charges, which carried a combined sentence of 65 years? Specially, almost after 10 months of worldwide propaganda, after terrorizing American Muslims community, and raising fear among the rest of the American population.

Your Honor, I do not know about you, but when I read the charges, 2, 3, 4, and 6, above, it truly scare the day lights out of me. They sound extremely serious. When Rezwan was arraigned after his arrest on September 28, 2011, and up until July 20, 2012, prosecution was so sure about these four charges. Do you think, they dropped these four charges now, because, our government is in the business of doing favor to the accused terrorist? We do not think so. We believe, the charges were dropped, because they were nothing but a deliberate ‘entrapment’ of a mentally ill person.

FINALLY, WE APPEAL TO YOU:

Your Honor, Rezwan had pleaded guilty to two charges, counts 1 and 5, as part of the plea deal, for which, he will be locked up, for 17 very long years. We understand that, your hands are tied, based on the plea deal. Still, November 01, 2012, will be an unbearable day for our family. Because we strongly believe, these two charges, should have been dropped, too. Rezwan was a mentally ill person and FBI knew about it, since, October 21, 2010, when two agents told me “obviously he has mental issues".  Still, they went ahead to entrap Rezwan, by sending a ‘gangstar’ and 'heroin addict' informant. The informant, a non-Muslim, hanged out in the mosque pretending to be a Muslim. This informant had "two convictions for selling drugs, unlawful restraint, a robbery conviction whose eight-year sentence he cut down to three by cooperating as a government witness elsewhere."

Your Honor, this informant, was given total freedom, by the FBI, to entrap Rezwan, which I have described in this statement. We know for sure that, it is the informant, who initiated the contact with Rezwan, on December 17, 2010, when he hugged Rezwan. Remember, when Rezwan asked “have we met before?” and informant replied “yeah.” This was a reply of a seasoned predator, who knew Rezwan’s mental illness ahead, and the sole purpose of pretending like a Muslim, inside the WIC mosque, was to entrap Rezwan. Your Honor, this was not supposed to happen in America. Government is not suppose to target their citizens, specially, the ones, who are vulnerable, through, an informant who has such a dangerous background. It is hard to believe, we have laws in this country, that allows, law enforcement official, to make such contradictory statement like “public was never in danger” than declare they have foiled a terror plot. How illogical and miss-leading position to take.      

Your Honor, Rezwan is very eager to recover from his mental illness. He diligently takes his medication. He tries his best to coup, and stay positive, by constantly reading books. Your Honor, our love for Rezwan is unwavering, and we are determined to give him whatever support is necessary, to make his every ‘unjust’ day under Solitary Confinement, bearable. We appeal to you, please give Rezwan, your generous considerations, in all matters, so that, he can recover from his mental illness. Your honor, I can assure you that, with your support, and with our support, one day, Rezwan, once again, will become a positive member of the ‘free’ society.  

Your Honor, November 01, 2012, is not only a sad day for our family; it is also a sad day for all the freedom loving people. One day, people in America, will look back to this day, and say, what we were thinking? How did we let, our government, take away the precious freedom of a young man, just because, he was an American Muslim? We should have known better, from the experiences of Japanese Americans during the Second World War, and experiences of African Americans prior to the Civil Rights Acts in the 1960s. Where does this stop, making scapegoat, out of our religious or ethnic minorities, in the name of security? Today, American Muslims, in the name of ‘war on terror’, tomorrow, may be American Chinese, if the relation between U.S. and China sours.  

Your Honor, we must stop manufacturing terrorism, for publicity stunt, wasting millions of ‘Tax Payer’s’ dollars. It does not do any good to American people and above all, it does not secure America, from the people, who want to do real harm. I have given the real life examples of those threats, since, July 20, 2012, the day Rezwan took the plea deal. It only poisons the environment by raising the mistrust, which eventually will make America more insecure.  We appeal to you, please give your considerations, so that, ordeal, like Rezwan’s, become, a thing of the past.

Your Honor, from day one, Rezwan’s ordeal, was a multi-act play. A play, written, produced, and directed by the FBI. Rezwan was one of the actors, playing his role subconsciously. It is the FBI, who pulled the curtain before the act, and it is the FBI, who lowered the curtain after the act. Each act was designed to awe the public, thereby, assuring, a maximum media blitz. Rezwan had no means, no capability, no mental and physical stability, to become a conscious actor, in this play. From the day one, writers, producers, and directors, of this play had only one goal, to receive a ‘great review’, and I must admit, they pulled out every string to achieve that. A ‘great review’, justifies the continued existence of a ‘luxurious lifestyle’, when millions of Americans, having tremendous hardship, just to get by. I remember, Assistant U.S. Attorney, stood outside the federal courthouse in Boston, on July 20, 2012, after Rezwan’s plea deal, and told the news media, “In the case of Ferdaus, what I would say is, ‘Please consider what did not happen here.’ No one was hurt,”

Your Honor, there was somebody, who was hurt. There was a victim. It was none other than our Rezwan, whose, ‘Freedom, Liberty, Equality, and Justice’, were taken away, in exchange of, unimaginable hardship and misery, under the Solitary Confinement.

Your Honor, our appeal to you:

“JUSTICE FOR REZWAN”,
“JUSTICE FOR AMERICAN MUSLIMS”,
“JUSTICE FOR ALL”.