Private U.S. team linked to jail
escape
Ex-minister held in the Green
Zone for graft has fled,
officials say.
By Borzou Daragahi, Times Staff
Writer
BAGHDAD -- A once-prominent
Iraqi American, jailed on
corruption charges,
was sprung from a Green Zone
prison this weekend by U.S.
security
contractors he had hired,
several Iraqi officials said.
Ayham Sameraei, a Chicago-area
businessman, returned to Iraq
after the 2003
U.S.-led invasion and assumed
the position of electricity
minister during
the interim government of former
Prime Minister Iyad Allawi.
A Sunni Arab who claimed ties to
the insurgency, Sameraei was
arrested in
August of this year and charged
with a dozen counts of
misallocating
millions of dollars in Iraqi
government money. He was
sentenced in October
to two years' imprisonment. At
that time, security contractors
took him to
the U.S. Embassy before he could
be jailed, but U.S. officials
handed him
over to Iraqi authorities.
A U.S. Embassy spokesman
confirmed Monday that Sameraei
was no longer in
prison. He said U.S. officials
scrambled into the evening to
locate him.
"We're aware of the reports,"
said Lou Fintor, the spokesman.
"We're looking
into them. We cannot comment
further until the facts are
determined.
"We are coordinating with the
Iraqi government, which is
currently
conducting an investigation into
this matter."
Neither the security contractors
nor their company was named by
Iraqi
officials Monday.
The reports about Sameraei came
on a day when bombings,
assassinations and
sectarian death squad killings
in Baghdad, Kirkuk and Mosul
left at least 54
Iraqis dead. Among those gunned
down Monday were a police
commando leader in
the western part of the capital
and a provincial council member
in Mosul, a
northern city.
The U.S. military also reported
that a soldier assigned to the
1st Brigade,
1st Armored Division, died in
combat Friday. He was killed in
the volatile
western province of Al Anbar. On
Monday, another soldier was
killed and one
was injured when their Bradley
fighting vehicle rolled over
north of
Baghdad, the military said.
There have been no suggestions
that American officials had a
role in
Sameraei's escape Sunday
afternoon. But the B-movie
scenario of a rich
businessman hiring armed muscle
to bust himself out of jail from
inside the
fortress-like, U.S.-protected
enclave could further contribute
to Iraq's
image of instability and
lawlessness. The flamboyant
former government
minister's arrest and
prosecution were held up by
Iraqi and U.S. officials
as a rare example of good
government prevailing in the new
Iraq.
His high-profile escape,
splashed across Iraqi television
channels Monday
night, also could further damage
the reputation of the U.S.,
which is
already believed by many Iraqis
to have wasted and stolen
billions of
dollars in Iraqi revenue.
Iraqi officials were enraged by
his escape and the suggestion
that any
Americans had a hand in it.
"We think that there are a lot
of terrorist operations through
the money
that was taken through
corruption," said Sheik Sabah
Saadi, chairman of the
Iraqi parliament's
anticorruption committee. "Ayham
Sameraei has announced
on more than one occasion about
his support for the resistance
and the
insurgents and even claimed he
was a mediator between the
resistance and
other factions."
Sameraei, who courted the media
even during his incarceration
and recently
gave a lengthy jailhouse
interview to the New York Times,
was nowhere to be
found Monday. He had claimed all
along that the charges against
him were
trumped up and politically
motivated.
Iraqi officials suspect an
inside job and have issued
warrants for Sameraei
and two police officials in
charge of guarding him at a
Green Zone police
station jailhouse.
According to Iraqi
anticorruption officials,
several sport utility vehicles
arrived Sunday at Sameraei's
Green Zone jailhouse. About 10
heavily armed
men identified as Americans
entered the single-story police
station, which
is usually guarded by three to
five police officers.
Here accounts diverged.
Some officials say the men asked
to see Sameraei and spoke with
him for half
an hour before escorting him
out, telling police he was
wanted in regard to
an unspecified judicial matter.
"When the policemen objected to
his removal, [the contractors]
said he was
being detained by a judicial
order," said the lead
investigator of the
escape, speaking on condition
that he not be named. "They took
him by force
and they left."
Another official said the
security contractors intimidated
the police
officers and quickly hustled
Sameraei out without firing a
shot.
"It was suspected that the
policemen cooperated," said
Judge Radhi Radhi,
head of the country's Commission
on Public Integrity, an
anticorruption
watchdog.
"The policemen said, 'We were
outnumbered and they were armed
and we didn't
have any means to defend
ourselves,' " Radhi said.
Yet another official said the
police didn't realize the
security contractors
had taken Sameraei until after
midnight, when officers alerted
anticorruption officials.
"The police said they didn't see
him getting removed," said Ali
Shaboot,
Radhi's deputy. "That's an
indication that he might have
been smuggled out."
The 12-hour lag between the
moment Sameraei disappeared and
the time police
officers guarding him finally
informed other officials raised
suspicions
that the officers were in on the
escape plan.
*
daragahi@latimes.com
Special correspondents in
Baghdad, Kirkuk and Mosul
contributed to this
report.
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