Detention Hearing Linked to Release

A federal judge said Tuesday that the Justice Department must release the co-founder of an Islamic charity accused of funneling money to terrorists unless it holds a new and open detention hearing for the man within 10 days.

Rabih Haddad, a Lebanese citizen who had been living in Ann Arbor, Mich., has been in federal custody since his Dec. 14 arrest on a visa violation. Since then, his detention hearings have been closed to the public and the news media.

“An open detention and removal hearing will assure the public that the government itself is honoring the very democratic principles that the terrorists who committed the atrocities of 9/11 sought to destroy,” U.S. District Judge Nancy Edmunds said in her 12-page ruling.

A Justice Department spokesman said the agency was reviewing the ruling.

Federal attorneys have argued that opening such hearings could give terrorists insight into the government’s strategy in the war on terrorism.

The American Civil Liberties Union, several newspapers and Rep. John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.) have sued to open the proceedings.

Edmunds said Tuesday that Haddad must receive a new hearing within 10 days of her order and that the hearing must be open to the public.

“The government has failed to make a particularized showing that its interests in fighting terrorism are implicated in Haddad’s case,” Edmunds wrote.

Ashraf Nubani, an attorney for Haddad, said he was ecstatic over Tuesday’s ruling, but he still expected the government to urge the new judge to close the hearing.

“It’s nonsense,” Nubani said. “Pastor Haddad has never in any sense of the word posed a threat to the nation’s security or had any involvement with the events of Sept. 11.”

The same day Haddad was arrested, the U.S. Treasury Department froze the bank accounts of his Global Relief Foundation and agents raided its suburban Chicago office.

The Bush administration has said it suspects Global Relief of having ties to terrorism, but no criminal charges have been filed against Haddad or the foundation, which Haddad helped found in 1992.

Global Relief, based in Bridgeview, Ill., says it provides food, emergency relief, medical aid and education training in more than 20 countries, including Pakistan, Iraq and Chechnya.