The wife of man arrested in Michigan on terrorism-related charges said Sunday her husband is innocent and only wanted to make some money by reselling cell phones.

Police discovered hundreds of cell phones and cell phone chargers in the vehicle the men were driving. (Nathan Rapheld/The Bay City Times/ Associated Press) Louai Abdelhamied Othman of Mesquite, Texas, his brother, Adham Abdelhamid Othman of Dallas, and their cousin Maruan Awad Muhareb of Mesquite were arrested Friday afternoon on the outskirts of Detroit after they purchased 80 cell phones from a Wal-Mart. Police said they found about 1,000 phones in their minivan.

The phones were mostly prepaid TracFones, which are not traceable.

The men were charged with collecting or providing materials for terrorist acts and surveillance of a vulnerable target for terrorist purposes. Police said justified the charges, saying that cell phones can be used as detonators.

"They're locked up in jail for something that they didn't do," Lina Odeh, 20, told the Associated Press on Saturday, adding that her husband, Louai Abdelhamied Othman, had been targeted because he is of Arab descent.

Odeh said her husband bought the phones with plans to sell them to a man in Dallas for a profit of $5 per phone. She said they travelled to Michigan because the phones were sold out in Dallas.

No pleas entered

No pleas were entered at the Saturday arraignment. A magistrate set bond at $750,000 apiece. The men are being held at the Tuscola County Jail, police said.

A pretrial hearing has been set for Friday and preliminary exam for Aug. 24.

Earlier last week, two other men were arrested in Marietta, Ohio, after they acknowledged purchasing about 600 phones in recent months.

Ali Houssaiky and Osama Abulhassan, both 20 and from the Detroit suburb of Dearborn, have been charged with money laundering in support of terrorism and soliciting or providing support for acts of terrorism. A preliminary hearing is set for Tuesday.

Defence lawyers said Houssaiky and Abulhassan also planned to resell the phones in a money-making bid. They accused officials of targeting the men because of their Arab heritage.

With files from the Associated Press

Let's see....the cheapest Tracfone is $20, the most expensive is $79..at Wally World.  So, you tie up from $200,000 to close to $800,000 not including sales tax, travel expenses driving all over the midwest for a possible $5,000 profit???

 BTW, all my local Wally Worlds have racks full of Tracfones and the messican pre-paid cell phones.


mm

According to Steve Emerson, Texas has been a hotbed of terrorist activity for a long, long time. There are/were several islamic charities based out of Texas, which in reality were fund raising front groups for Islamic Jihad, HezBULLah and Hamas.

And why not? They have an easy access point at the border.

Quoted: Quoted: Let's see....the cheapest Tracfone is $20, the most expensive is $79..at Wally World.  So, you tie up from $200,000 to close to $800,000 not including sales tax, travel expenses driving all over the midwest for a possible $5,000 profit???  BTW, all my local Wally Worlds have racks full of Tracfones and the messican pre-paid cell phones. mm $20 x $1,000 = $20,000. $5,000 profit on $20,000 is good margin for unskilled labor. Very peculiar story, though.

 I didn't even realize I made that mistake until you pointed it out.  Well, it does make the profit margin much more attractive.  But you still need to factor in the expense of driving around and lodging(if they used it).

 A friend of mine has a covenience store in Mesquite, he sells the $60 Tracfones and he buys them for about $39 each...5 at a time, from Tracfone.

 I think it's more plausible that they were buying them out of state so they wouldn't be recognized going in and out of the same DFW stores with armloads of cell phones.  FWIW, the closest store to me now has the phones locked in a case.

 mm

Quoted: According to Steve Emerson, Texas has been a hotbed of terrorist activity for a long, long time. There are/were several islamic charities based out of Texas, which in reality were fund raising front groups for Islamic Jihad, HezBULLah and Hamas.

Might as well call DFW "Lower Detroit" now, huh?

Seriously though, a former colleague got out of academia to go teach at an Islamic school there in DFW.  I haven't heard much/anything out of this person since.......

Quoted: Quoted: Let's see....the cheapest Tracfone is $20, the most expensive is $79..at Wally World.  So, you tie up from $200,000 to close to $800,000 not including sales tax, travel expenses driving all over the midwest for a possible $5,000 profit???  BTW, all my local Wally Worlds have racks full of Tracfones and the messican pre-paid cell phones. mm $20 x $1,000 = $20,000. $5,000 profit on $20,000 is good margin for unskilled labor. Very peculiar story, though.

They were in a van though, right?  What about fuel/food costs for round trip?

But what was the deal with taking out the batteries and discarding the chargers?  That makes even less sense if they were re-selling them.

This has been going on for a while.  
My previous job was Procurement Director.
Heres the deal...You buy all the Trac phones (Nokia 1100's) you can for $19.99 plus tax.  
I pay you back for the phone and anywhere from $5-$7 bucks per unit.  I have $26 bucks into a phone that would cost $54-57 bucks wholesale. This is well above the normal profit margin in the phone wholesale arena.

 

Quoted: This has been going on for a while.   My previous job was Procurement Director. Heres the deal...You buy all the Trac phones (Nokia 1100's) you can for $19.99 plus tax.   I pay you back for the phone and anywhere from $5-$7 bucks per unit.  I have $26 bucks into a phone that would cost $54-57 bucks wholesale. This is well above the normal profit margin in the phone wholesale arena.

I still don't understand. If anyone can buy a Nokia 1100 for $19.99, why would you buy them for $26.99 and how does this now make the phone worth $57.00 wholesale? Isn't the phone still only worth $19.99? What am I missing?

The Texas prison system has a big problem with asswipes smuggling in prepaid cell phones to the crooks. Maybe this was intended for that rather than terroists. Either way they all need the charlie daniels treatment.

Quoted: Quoted: This has been going on for a while.   My previous job was Procurement Director. Heres the deal...You buy all the Trac phones (Nokia 1100's) you can for $19.99 plus tax.   I pay you back for the phone and anywhere from $5-$7 bucks per unit.  I have $26 bucks into a phone that would cost $54-57 bucks wholesale. This is well above the normal profit margin in the phone wholesale arena.   I still don't understand. If anyone can buy a Nokia 1100 for $19.99, why would you buy them for $26.99 and how does this now make the phone worth $57.00 wholesale? Isn't the phone still only worth $19.99? What am I missing?

Trac Fone subsidized the phone in hopes that people will buy them to use on their prepaid service.  If you buy the same phone (Nokia 1100 for example) from Brightpoint (Nokia’s major distributor in the US) the same phone would cost you in the mid fifty dollar range.
There are tons of smaller regional pre-paid companies out there who will buy these things all day for say 50 bucks…You just doubled your money with no real work.

Quoted: Trac Fone subsidized the phone in hopes that people will buy them to use on their prepaid service.  If you buy the same phone (Nokia 1100 for example) from Brightpoint (Nokia’s major distributor in the US) the same phone would cost you in the mid fifty dollar range. There are tons of smaller regional pre-paid companies out there who will buy these things all day for say 50 bucks…You just doubled your money with no real work.

But why throw away the chargers ?

Quoted: But why throw away the chargers ?

If someone is using them as disposable, single-use phones to avoid surveillance, there's no point in carrying a battery and charger for every phone.  All they need is the new phone with a different number, but can use the same accessories.  They can use one battery that they KNOW is charged, rather than trying to remember if all the phones got charged.  Also, a stack of phones is heavy enough, so by ditching the batteries and chargers they can save weight.

Quoted: Quoted: But why throw away the chargers ? If someone is using them as disposable, single-use phones to avoid surveillance, there's no point in carrying a battery and charger for every phone.  All they need is the new phone with a different number, but can use the same accessories.  They can use one battery that they KNOW is charged, rather than trying to remember if all the phones got charged.  Also, a stack of phones is heavy enough, so by ditching the batteries and chargers they can save weight.

Possum, I agree with your theory, but  let me rephrase the question,

Is there any legitimate  reason to throw away the charger ? Can any of the apologists for these guys give me reason why they would throw away the charger ?

Not sure if I qualify as an apologist, however having 18 years in the wireless industry (most in procurement) so I think I rate as an expert in this field.
The reason is plain and simple...It's Money.
There is cheaper stuff out there if the guys wanted to use a phone for IED's or some super top secret on the down low phone calls.

FWIW I was contacted by the lead attorney for Trac Fone about a year ago concerning this very issue…certain companies were buying large amounts of phones to reflash and resell.  
I commend LE for keeping their eyes open, however on this one they are just plain wrong.

Thanks for the info, Tonster.

I would like to note for the record that I referred to them as "Terror Suspects".

Quoted: According to Steve Emerson, Texas has been a hotbed of terrorist activity for a long, long time. There are/were several islamic charities based out of Texas, which in reality were fund raising front groups for Islamic Jihad, HezBULLah and Hamas.

And of course I have to live in the one of the most predominate areas for these kind of activities prosecuted. Richardson, TX.

Quoted: Not sure if I qualify as an apologist, however having 18 years in the wireless industry (most in procurement) so I think I rate as an expert in this field. The reason is plain and simple...It's Money. There is cheaper stuff out there if the guys wanted to use a phone for IED's or some super top secret on the down low phone calls. FWIW I was contacted by the lead attorney for Trac Fone about a year ago concerning this very issue…certain companies were buying large amounts of phones to reflash and resell.   I commend LE for keeping their eyes open, however on this one they are just plain wrong.

+1 100% agree. When this story originally aired I was under the impression that law enforcement had cause....they didn't. Simply because you do not understand the reasoning behind their money making efforts does not a criminal make.

I don't have cable, so the closest I can come is watching the crawl at the bottom of the screen on the Fox Weather/Radio channel.

Saw yesterday morning or evening that these gentlemen were no longer considered terror suspects, but they were still being held on other, unrelated warrants (read: stemming from incidents prior to this debacle).

Don't know if that'll pan out to be  true or not, but I thought to myself: "If true, that's frigging funny."

Quoted: Quoted: Is there any legitimate  reason to throw away the charger ? Can any of the apologists for these guys give me reason why they would throw away the charger ? You keep asking this, but nowhere in the article does it say they were throwing away the charger. I have three phones of the same kind and I have thrown away the charger to the other two, so there are plenty of reasons to throw them away.

I think that may come from a pic that was widely distributed, and was also in the DMN last week.  It showed a box full of chargers and a box full of batteries.  Possibly they separated them for repackaging.


 mm

Quoted: Quoted: Is there any legitimate  reason to throw away the charger ? Can any of the apologists for these guys give me reason why they would throw away the charger ? You keep asking this, but nowhere in the article does it say they were throwing away the charger. I have three phones of the same kind and I have thrown away the charger to the other two, so there are plenty of reasons to throw them away.

I know not everyone is like me, but I'm the opposite.  I always buy *more*.

The last cell phone/plan upgrade, the wife and I got the same phone for the first time ever.  We *each* have one at home, on our respective nightstands.  We each have one in our offices at work.  And we have one car charger in the - you guessed it - car.