Federal limits on witness are finally removed
BOISE — Former University of Idaho football player Abdullah Al-Kidd is finally free to live and travel where he wants, after a federal court removed restrictions placed on Al-Kidd as a material witness.
Al-Kidd, a U.S. citizen, was arrested as he boarded a plane for Saudi Arabia in March of 2003, headed out on a scholarship to study Islamic law for a year. He was held as a material witness in Sami Omar Al-Hussayen’s terrorism trial, ordered to live with his in-laws in Las Vegas and restricted to travel only within a four-state region.
Last week, federal District Judge Edward Lodge signed an order removing the restrictions and returning Al-Kidd’s passport to him. Al-Hussayen was acquitted on terrorism charges by a unanimous jury on June 10, after an eight-week trial. Al-Kidd never was called to testify in the trial.
Al-Kidd’s attorney, federal public defender Dick Rubin, said, “I’m glad that at this point in time he’s able to resume the rest of his life.”
He added, “He was obviously very relieved about it, and is just going to try to put this behind him.”
Al-Kidd, formerly known as Lavoni T. Kidd before his conversion to Islam several years ago, was a friend of Al-Hussayen’s from their Moscow, Idaho, days. Al-Hussayen, a graduate student in computer science, was accused of aiding terrorists by helping maintain a series of Islamic Web sites, but jurors rejected the charge.
Al-Hussayen also was charged with seven counts of visa fraud and four of false statements for the same computer activities, charging that those activities weren’t covered by his student visa. The jury acquitted him on two visa fraud charges and one charge of false statements, but deadlocked on the remaining eight immigration charges, leading Lodge to declare a mistrial on those.
Prosecutors still are weighing whether to retry Al-Hussayen on the remaining immigration charges, and may announce their decision this week.
Lodge, in an order issued last week, wrote, “While the trial did not resolve all of the counts in the action, the government has notified the court that it has no opposition to releasing Mr. Al-Kidd as a material witness and lifting the conditions imposed upon him as a result of his material witness status in this matter.”
When he was first apprehended at Washington, D.C.’s Dulles International Airport, federal authorities said Al-Kidd had a $5,000, first-class, one-way ticket to Saudi Arabia, and they feared he wouldn’t return to testify in the Al-Hussayen case. That later turned out to be a $1,700, round-trip coach ticket with an open return date.
Al-Kidd, a former Vandal running back, said he had planned to continue overseas studies he began earlier by studying Islamic law and the Arabic language in Yemen, from August of 2001 to April of 2002.
During his travel restrictions, Al-Kidd worked for a moving company in Nevada.