January 31, 2007

Florida: Muslim doctor "volunteered as a medic for the al-Qaida military"

Aid and comfort to the enemy. "Judge: Doctor Can't Treat Terrorists," by Larry Neumeister for Associated Press, with thanks to Mackie:

NEW YORK (AP) -- A doctor accused of pledging to treat al-Qaida members can be prosecuted because medical care counts as material support to terrorists under federal law, a judge said Tuesday.

Dr. Rafiq Abdus Sabir, an Ivy League-educated doctor, had argued it was unconstitutional to prosecute a doctor for providing medical services.

He was arrested in May 2005 at his home in Boca Raton, Fla., accused in a plot to assist terrorist organizations along with a New York jazz musician, a Brooklyn bookstore owner and a former Washington, D.C., cabdriver. Sabir has pleaded not guilty and remained jailed since his arrest....

The judge said Sabir is not charged merely for being a doctor or for performing medical services.

"Here, Sabir is alleged essentially to have volunteered as a medic for the al-Qaida military, offering to make himself available specifically to attend to the wounds of injured fighters," she said. "Much as a military force needs weapons, ammunition, trucks, food and shelter, it needs medical personnel to tend to its wounded."