Immigration laws used to hod 3 Pakistanis in NY bomber case

NY Times:

Three Pakistani men taken into custody during a series of raids across the Northeast as part of the investigation into the failed Times Square car bombing may have provided money to the man who has admitted carrying out the unsuccessful attack, Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. said Thursday.

Mr. Holder said it was unclear if the men knew that the funds they provided were going to be used for an act of terrorism — one that Obama administration officials have said was aided and directed by the Pakistani Taliban. As of late Thursday, they were being detained on civil immigration violations and had not been charged with a crime.

Several people briefed on the case said that Faisal Shahzad, the naturalized Pakistani immigrant who the authorities say drove the crude car bomb into Times Square, traveled to the suburban Long Island community of Ronkonkoma in the days before the failed May 1 attack to collect several thousand dollars in cash, some of which he used to finance his plan.

But the people could not say whether the person who provided that money was one of the men taken into custody, and it was unclear whether the person was aware of what Mr. Shahzad intended to do with the money.

Two of the men taken into custody in the early-morning raids were picked up after one of two searches in the Boston area, part of a sweep in which Federal Bureau of Investigation agents and local police officers executed six search warrants there, in New Jersey and on Long Island. A third man was taken into custody in Maine.

Mr. Holder called the development “a significant step” when he was asked for details about the three men.

He said the men were connected to Mr. Shahzad, 30, but investigators were “trying to determine exactly what the nature of the connection was.”

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Other reports indicated the men were being held on immigration charges for the time being. This is something that was done by the Bush administration after 9-11 in order to sort out what charges ultimately may be brought. It is interesting to see a Democrat administration having to adopt the same policies they criticized.