Day 1 Liberty City Seven Pre-Trial: The government’s first witness takes the stand.
by Peter Graves-Goodman Sunday, Jul. 02, 2006 at 9:08 PM
imcmiami@yahoo.com

On the first day of the Liberty City Seven pre-trial 6 of the 7 defendants plead “Not Guilty”. The prosecution opened with their indictment which sounded ironclad. I silently said to myself, these guys are in real trouble. Then a defense attorney starts to question the government's first witness, the representative FBI agent who is one of the three Liberty City Seven case agents, and slowly the case against the 7 starts to crumble.

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The FBI agent answers numerous questions like, Did you find any weapons, explosives, maps, documents, schematics, drawings, etc., that show a plan to commit a terrorist act. FBI agent answers NO! It is brought out that, Batiste when talking to the Arab al Qaida informant used a box of tissues to represent the Sears tower and an ashtray to represent something else when discussing how they were going to take down the Sears tower. Defense Attorney asks were there any drawing, photos etc., relating to the inside the tower or had anyone actually been inside the tower. Agent says no, not that he knows of.

It was also brought out that the Arab al Qaida informant said he has an explosive expert in Europe, but Batiste says he has his own explosive expert. Defense Attorney asks FBI agent about this, did he know who Batiste’s explosive expert was. Agent says they heard it was a relative of Batiste who was in the military or had been in the military. Defense Attorney asks, did you find out who it was. Agent says no, they weren’t able to find out anything about who it might be.

In retrospect, after hearing the first day’s evidence in court, my feelings are three-fold: 1- That Batiste and the Liberty City Seven are just nuts (His father even says that he is mentally ill); 2- Batiste has been playing the Arab al Qaida informant to get money; or 3- He is a confidential informant for a police agency trying to help them develop a case so he can make some big bucks. (He makes $30,000 a year in construction. If he caught a case he could work as an informant and get $100,000 a year.)

Finally, there is not any credible evidence that the Liberty City Seven were really conducting or were ever going to conduct, any terrorist act.

Day 2 of the Liberty City Seven trial resumes on Wednesday, July 5th.

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