Justice Dept. keeps lid on rubout of Detroit imam

The U.S. Justice Department summoned numerous Muslim, Arab-American, Asian-American, civil libertarian and civil rights organizations to the downtown McNamara Building on Oct. 13 under the guise of providing a briefing on their investigation into the shooting death of Imam Luqman Ameen Abdullah by FBI agents at a Dearborn warehouse on Oct. 28, 2009. When the meeting was about to convene, the government issued a press release stating that all FBI agents involved in the killing of Imam Abdullah were absolved of any criminal liability.

Several community organizations as well as Rep. John Conyers of Detroit, who is chair of the House Judiciary Committee in the U.S. Congress, had called for an internal Justice Department review of the killing of the imam. The Justice Department report comes on the heels of two other similar findings by both Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox and the Dearborn Police Department.

All three reports released by the law-enforcement agencies involved in the killing have been rejected by Muslim and community organizations throughout metropolitan Detroit. At a press conference on Oct. 14 at the Muslim Center on Detroit’s Westside, the son of Imam Abdullah stated that the report relied only on interviews given by the agents involved and informants for the FBI who had infiltrated Imam Abdullah’s mosque for over two years.

The report issued by the Dearborn police indicated that counterterrorism agents were flown in from Quantico, Va., to execute the raid. Other agencies present included Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police as well as the Detroit and Dearborn police departments. Members of the Michigan Emergency Committee Against War & Injustice (MECAWI), which organized three demonstrations in the aftermath of the imam’s killing, stated that Imam Abdullah’s death was “a targeted assassination.”

The Detroit Committee to Stop FBI-Grand Jury Repression will hold its next meeting on Oct. 27 at the offices of MECAWI, located at 5920 Second Ave., just north of the Wayne State University campus at 7:00 p.m.

Azikiwe is editor of the Pan-African News Wire.