RUTHFULLY YOURS

The FBI Joint Terrorism Taskforce last week arrested Omar Abdulsattar Ameen, 45, an accused ISIS and al-Qaeda terrorist who lied about his background to gain entry to the United States.

The Iraqi national, a DOJ statement explains, “participated in various activities in support of those terrorist organizations, including helping to plant improvised explosive devices, and committing the murder that is the subject of the extradition request.  Ameen concealed his membership in those terrorist groups when he applied for refugee status, and later when he applied for a green card in the United States.”

According to the statement, after the town of Rawah fell to the Islamic State on June 21, 2014, “Ameen entered the town with a caravan of ISIS vehicles and drove to the house of the victim, who had served as an officer in the Rawah Police Department.  On the evening of June 22, 2014, after the caravan arrived at the victim’s house, Ameen and other members of the convoy allegedly opened fire on the victim.  Ameen then allegedly fired his weapon at the victim while the victim was on the ground, killing him.”

Iraq seeks the extradition of Ameen, who had been living comfortably in Sacramento, California, taking college classes and working an at auto body shop. The FBI has information that Ameen had been a member of al Qaeda and ISIS since 2004, and that his family helped found al Qaeda in Iraq. According to witnesses, the Ameen home served as a headquarters for ISIS in Rawah. In a 2006 attack on Iraqi army headquarters in the Al Karabilah area, the government charges, Ameen took soldiers as prisoners and executed them.

As the Sacramento Bee reported, Ameen “arrived in Turkey in April 2012 to begin the process of seeking asylum, and lied about his background, claiming his father had been killed because he had cooperated with U.S. forces.” According to court documents his father died in 2010 from a cerebral clot.

In June, 2014 Ameen gained approval to come to the United States as a refugee but returned to Iraq many times. In January 2015 he drove a truck for a thrift store in Salt Lake City. When he came to Sacramento in May, 2016, he “repeatedly lied about his past, saying he had never killed anyone, used weapons against people or belonged to violent groups.” Locals had no clue about Ameen’s background and some were skeptical about the arrest.

“There is a lot of conflicting information in which it’s sometimes difficult to ascertain immediately who a person is.” That was law professor Omar Dajani, a former negotiator for the Palestine Liberation Organization, and who served with the United Nations Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process.

POTUS 44 told the nation refugees were accepted “only after subjecting them to rigorous screening and security checks,” with “biometrics” and such, but United Nations and U.S. officials apparently accepted Omar Ameen’s story without question.  “Everyone would agree that this is a failure of the system to let this happen,” defense attorney Mark Reichel told Fox News, “and that with his background, Ameen should never have been admitted to the United States as a refugee.”

“We’ve admitted tens of thousands with no effective screening plan,” candidate Donald Trump warned during the 2016 election campaign. “We have no idea who we are letting in.” Omar Ameen got in, and after his arrest California governor Jerry Brown, a three-time contender for president of the United States, responded in curious fashion.

In 2015, after Islamic terrorists Syed Farook and Tashfeen Malik murdered 14 in San Bernardino, Brown warned that “people who are committed to the jihadist doctrine are going to be killing people in very unexpected places.” And the California Democrat pledged to spend more time “making sure that our federal-state collaboration really is working.”

Despite that claim, the arrest of Omar Ameen prompted no statement from Brown hailing the FBI Joint Terrorism Taskforce or warning about the dangers of fake refugees committed to jihadist doctrine. Brown and his attorney general Xavier Becerra, once on Hillary Clinton’s short list as a running mate, support sanctuary state laws that protect even violent criminals from deportation. Two days after the arrest of Ameen, governor Brown made a move that might be considered a response.

On Friday, the Sacramento Bee reported, Brown “pardoned three Cambodian refugees facing deportation by federal immigration authorities,” Vanna In, Heng Lao and Phal Sok, all natives of Cambodia, came to the United States legally, as refugees. Vanna In, who murdered a rival gang member, was already under deportation orders and for the three refugees, Brown’s pardon “will help them avoid that fate.”  In 2017 Brown issued three pardons to former convicts who had already been deported to Mexico.

Meanwhile, Omar Ameen is being held as a flight risk and danger to the community and on Monday he faces a hearing in Sacramento. Several ISIS radicals have recently been sentenced to prison terms in California and in 2015 FBI director James Comey said “those people exist in every state.”