M F P O LI O l H-# 1 • MEMORANDUM FOR THE RECORD Event Interview of FBI Special Agent Wade Ammerman Type of event Interview Dates October 16 2003 Special Access Issues None Prepared by Michael Jacobson Team Number 1 A Location FBI Washington Field Office Participants Participants • — — Non Commission Assistant General Counsel Bob Sinton - Commission John Tamm Hyon Kim Raj De Michael Jacobson Ammerman has been an FBI agent for 8 years and has been assigned to WFO for his entire career He has worked IT for that whole time and is currently assigned to IT-3 Don Demay's squad Ammerman is on the Emergency Response Team and as a result on 9 11 he was assigned to the Pentagon to assist with recovering the bodies By the time that he returned to WFO the Aulaqi investigation had begun The FBI initiated the investigation after learning from a San Diego source about Aulaqi's relationship with the hijackers The exact nature of that relationship was not clear It seemed to be like an imam-young Muslim type of relationship Through' 'the FBI had also connected Aulaqi to Omar Al-Bayoumi San Diego took an initial look at Aulaqi until WFO took over the investigation 9 11 Classified Information I WFO interviewed him 4 times after 9 11 in September to try and flesh out the story there should be 4 separate 302s Aulaqi admitted to knowing aI-Hazmi but said that he did not know al-Mihdhar Beyond that the FBI has been unable to connect him to the hijackers Brad Deardorf is the agent who showed Aulaqi the photo spread and we should talk to him if we want more details about that Ammerman does not know what the agents involved in these interviews thought about Aulaqi's credibility and truthfulness in these interviews Aulaqi left San Diego in about September or October of 2000 and returned to Yemen He returned from Aulaqi moved from San Diego to Falls Church in January Kama E o 244P '11% u -e- at4 14411dial Val 7117 49 9 11 Law Enforcement Sensitive • -REcker-2001 Aulaqi moved to Falls Church according to Ammerman because he received an offer at the Dar al-Hijra mosque and it was a better offer than he had in San Diego Ammerman thinks that Samir Aboissa is probably the one who made the offer to Aulaqi Aulaqi left Washington for Yemen in March 2002 He returned to the U S in October 2002 before fleeing again to Yemen Aulaqi went to a conference in England but then went straight back to Yemen He left his wife and family back in Washington to sell their house and to move back to Yemen Ammerman thinks that Aulaqi got nervous after receiving a call from one of the managers of one of the escort services saying that an FBI agent named Wade had been there asking questions about him Ammerman thinks that Aulaqi may want to return to the U S He called SA Icey Jenkins several weeks ago from Yemen she was one of the agents who interviewed Aulaqi after 9 11 and left a message on her machine saying that he wanted to speak to her He left his email address on her machine Aulaqi is on the Watch list now but there is no warrant for him 9 11 Classified Information • The most significant thing that WFO discovered in the investigation was that Aulaqi had an interest in high priced prostitutes and he would frequent them once a week I 9 11 Classified Information I As far as how Aulaqi paid for the prostitutes he drew a good salary from the mosque and he also sold a lecture series on CD He received about $4 000 a month The IRS has also taken a look at Aulaqi's finances In addition the State Department looked at his passport and one of his social security cards and thought that there was some inaccurate information They actually got an arrest warrant for him for passport fraud but when he returned to the U S they decided not to pursue this The name al-Rababah rings a bell to Ammerman There is nothing to support the contention that Aulaqi talked to him about helping the hijackers They interviewed many people about this The people they interviewed could have been protecting Aulaqi But he agrees that the facts surrounding Aulaqi are very suspicious He feels the same way that we do but they couldn't prove it He doesn't really know Ammerman also said that there are many times that imams will talk to young guys The Dar al-Hijra is a very busy mosque It's not beyond comprehension that Aulaqi could have met people and not remember them The name Daoud Chehazeh does not ring a bell to Ammerman Ammerman said that the reporting about Aulaqi having closed door meetings with the two hijackers and Modhar Abdullah came from I source Ammerman said that 2 • Hamas will will sometimes try and spot radical young potential recruits and invite them to closed door type meetings But different groups do different things It's also not uncommon for people to get together with imams after hours for extra study sessions On face value the closed door meetings are nothing to be alarmed about Aulaqi sells his CDs through Al-Bashir publishing out of the Denver area There 9 11 Law Enforcement Sensitive lAulaqi was in contact with the Yemeni Embassy He was at GW in a PhD program He was on a scholarship from the Yemeni government He was a real student and actually went to classes Aulaqi had an indirect link to Ramzi Yousef There was an individual in Herndon who was connected to the SAFA Group and was the subject of a Greenquest investigation with whom both Aulaqi and Yousef were in contact • The Ayah Islamic Prayer Center rings a bell Ammerman doesn't know a lot about the Maryland mosques though Regarding Motaz al-Hallak there has been some contact between him and Aulaqi but not enough to indicate that they are close It is common for imams to talk Aulaqi is in contact with Tamimi the imam of the Dar alArqam mosque When Aulaqi came back to the U S in October 2002 he went to Timimi's home Aulaqi has also spoken at this mosque Ammerman noted that the Virginia jihad case was out of the Dar al-Arqam mosque and that he served as the case agent for this investigation The Dar al-Hijra moque is not as Salafi as the others Most of Aulaqi's lectures are pretty mainstream 9 11 Classified Information They weren't able to establish any other ties b etween the two They were never able to fully establish that Aulaqi was actually a member of the Muslim Hackers Club There was a reference to him being associated with the Club but this never really went anywhere The Muslim Hackers Club case was turned over to NJPC at HQ and he doesn't know the results of their investigation Aulaqi has not engaged in Paintball in the DC area He thinks that Aulaqi is more of a recreational player than someone training for jihad He doesn't know about the number for Dar al-Hijra being found in the residence of a member of the Hamburg cell He would definitely want to look into this but he wouldn't lose any sleep over this The mosque is such a focal point It doesn't say anything on its own • The Dar al-Hijra mosque has been the object of FBI investigation for a long time Marzook and other Hamas activists were gathering there But the FBI realized that there is a lot more going on there than just radical activity He would be hesitant to characterize the Dar al-Hijra as an extremist mosque People do go there to talk in small 3 -SEC-RE-T- • groups confident that the FBI will not be able to listen in This is a real challenge for the FBI They haven't taken a look at the funding of the Dar al-Hijra mosque for First Amendment reasons They do have many subjects there He doesn't know whether or not any Saudi diplomats attend services there He recalls hearing about North American Islamic Trust and thinks that there may be a relationship between NAIT and the mosque He thinks he might have seen this in Choicepoint He doesn't know though who holds the title to the mosque He does not know whether al-Haramain has any ties to the mosque His cases have focused more on the individual subjects and not on the mosque itself 9 11 Classified Information As far as Samir Salah there are two guy associated with the mosque with similar names One is the subject of an investigation and one is not He thinks that Abdulrahman al-Amoudi probably attended the mosque but he doesn't know of any connections between him and Aulaqi Ammerman was asked about the speculation that the hijackers may have lived with Aulaqi for several weeks He said that he's taken a look at the records There is certainly circumstantial evidence that they were in the same places at the same time The hijackers went to many of the areas Mt of Olives the Butcher shop frequented by Aulaqi They have ATM transactions for the hijackers there but none for Aulaqi It's certainly very suspicious If they were not living with Aulaqi he's not sure where they might have been living We should ask Chris Mamula about that It appears that the hijackers just drifted from place to place He has not heard of Lincoln Higgee the individual referenced in the Newsweek article Ammerman does not think that the fact that Aulaqi was flying on 9 11 is suspicious He's not familiar with 1 1 2000 visit to Aulaqi andl 1 or about San -Diego's suspicions about his 9 ' 9 11 Personal Privacy 9 11 Classified Information • Personal Privacy -1 Ammerman is not familiar with the reporting about Aulaqi fighting in Bosnia Chechna or about him training in Afghanistan 4 9 11 Classified Information Ammerman did not really have much interaction with the San Diego investigations workin this case The primary people with whom he dealt were Steve 9 11 Law Butler and 9 11 Classified Information • 5 Enforcement Privacy