Late on Friday, two men were charged with conspiring to support al-Qaida, including a former senior manager at PricewaterhouseCoopers, according to the AP. Wesam El-Hanafi a computer engineer, and Sabirhan Hasanoff, the former P. Dub SM, were both in court on Friday after being arrested overseas and returned to the United States from Dubai. The AP reports that the "vaguely-worded" indictment states that El-Hanafi was instructed by al-Qaida "on operational security measures and directed him to perform tasks for al-Qaida" and that Hasanoff was paid $50,000 by an unnamed co-conspirator and was ordered to perform unspecified tasks for AQ in New York. The U.S. Attorney was quoted that the two men are accused of helping "to modernize al-Qaida by providing computer systems expertise and other goods and services," which involved purchasing seven Casio watches (?).
Prosecutors described Hasanoff only as a dual citizen of the United States and Australia who has lived in Brooklyn. Public records show he has a Queens address and is a certified public accountant. A professional networking site says a Sabir Hasanoff was a senior manager at Pricewaterhouse Coopers who graduated from Baruch College in Manhattan. Pricewaterhouse spokesman Kelly Howard said the accounting firm employed Hasanoff from 2003 to 2006.
This LinkedIn profile shows the details reported by the AP. A call to PwC was not immediately returned. The Sydney Morning Herald reported that Hasanoff's brother and sister-in-law had not spoken to him in 12 years, "No, he was never in trouble. I don't know what's happened now. He studied at a private school. Maybe he has changed. I don't know if he's a good person or a bad person because we haven't been connected now for a long time.'' We're not insinuating that his time at PwC was the reason for his lifestyle change but three years at any Big 4 firm would change anybody. That being said, turning to terrorism is deplorable. Couldn't he have developed a dependancy problem of some kind instead?
2 men charged in NYC with supporting terror [AP]
2 U.S. men charged with aiding al-Qaida [UPI]
Australian 'linked' to al-Qaeda [Sydney Morning Herald]
