Judge in Siegelman Case Owned a Company That Helped Train 9/11 Terrorist Mohamed Atta

Mohamed Atta

The judge in the Don Siegelman prosecution owned a company that helped train 9/11 pilot Mohamed Atta, according to a report from a Washington, D.C.-based investigative journalist.

U.S. District Judge Mark Fuller owned a 43.75 percent stake in Doss Aviation, a Colorado firm that has received lucrative federal contracts. Doss Aviation helped train Mohamed Atta, according to a new article from Wayne Madsen Report (WMR).

Atta is believed to have piloted American Airlines Flight 11 into the North Tower of the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. Multiple reports in the mainstream press have stated that Atta trained at Maxwell Air Force Base in Montgomery, where Fuller has served as a judge in the Middle District of Alabama since his 2002 appointment by President George W. Bush.

WMR reports that Fuller's company assisted in Atta's flight training. From WMR, in a piece dated August 3-5, 2012: (WMR is a subscription site, and a link is not available to the content; we have received permission to run excerpts from the piece.)

U.S. Judge for the the Middle District of Alabama Mark Fuller, scheduled to re-sentence former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman on August 3 in Montgomery, was the previous owner of a firm that trained accused 9/11 lead hijacker Mohamed Atta. The information on Fuller's links to the 9/11 attack were uncovered by a former Republican Party campaign aid in Alabama who spoke to WMR on background.

Madsen's article first appeared last Friday morning, just before Fuller was to resentence Siegelman, the former Democratic governor of Alabama. Fuller proceeded to sentence Siegelman to five years and nine months in federal prison, on top of time already served--plus a $50,000 fine and 500 hours of community service. Siegelman would be 72 years old upon release if he serves the entire sentence. Fuller ordered that Siegelman turn himself over to federal custody by a curious date--Tuesday, September 11, 2012.

Does Fuller have reason to be fascinated with the date September 11? Madsden suggests the answer is yes:

WMR previously reported on Fuller's financial dealings with Doss Aviation, which, among other government business, had the contract to re-fuel Air Force One. Having had trained Atta, as well as Saudi, Iranian, and other Egyptian pilots to fly aircraft, the Colorado Springs, Colorado-based Doss Aviation was in a position to help carry out threats against Air Force One that were received by the presidential airplane's pilot on 9/11, specifically "Angel is next." Angel was the classified code word used at the time to denote Air Force One. 

Ironically, as we reported earlier: "It is also noteworthy that the Doss Aviation active contract web page has a photo of the World Trade Center shaded in the colors of the U.S. flag. Fuller's firm has seen a growth in contracts and profits since the 9/11 attacks and U.S. military action in Iraq and Afghanistan."

The Washington Post, Newsweek, and Knight Ridder are among the mainstream news outlets to report that 9/11 pilots attended military training courses in the United States. Reporter Guy Gugliotta wrote a piece titled "Reconstructing the Hijackers' Last Days," for The Washington Post on September 16, 2001. From the Gugliotta article:

As the investigation gathered strength Saturday, unusual leads began to surface, among them the possibility that some of the hijackers may have received training at Pensacola Naval Air Station in Florida or other U.S. military facilities. 

Two of 19 suspects named by the FBI, Saeed Alghamdi and Ahmed Alghamdi, have the same names as men listed at a housing facility for foreign military trainees at Pensacola. Two others, Hamza Alghamdi and Ahmed Alnami, have names similar to individuals listed in public records as using the same address inside the base. 

In addition, a man named Saeed Alghamdi graduated from the Defense Language Institute at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas, while men with the same names as two other hijackers, Mohamed Atta and Abdulaziz Alomari, appear as graduates of the U.S. International Officers School at Maxwell Air Force Base, Ala., and the Aerospace Medical School at Brooks Air Force Base in San Antonio, respectively. 

"Some of the FBI suspects had names similar to those used by foreign alumni of U.S. military courses," the Air Force acknowledged in a statement. "However, discrepancies in their biographical data, such as birth dates 20 years off, indicate we are probably not talking about the same people."

A Knight Ridder report at the time, however, specifically pointed to the terrorist Mohamed Atta as training in Montgomery. That was outlined in a report titled "Did Terrorist Pilots Train at U.S. Military Schools?" by investigative reporter Daniel Hopsicker. From the article, dated October 30, 2001:

In addition to having been inducted into the U.S. flight training program by two Dutch-owned flight schools in Venice, Florida, as many as six of the terrorists accused of hijacking four airliners on Sept. 11, including ringleader Mohammed Atta, also received training at U.S. military facilities, according to a flurry of stories between Sept. 15 and 17 in the Washington Post, Newsweek, and Knight Ridder newspapers. 

The story had an extremely short life. 

Newsweek reported that “U.S. military sources have given the FBI information that suggests five of the alleged hijackers of the planes used in Tuesday’s terror attacks received training at secure U.S. military installations in the 1990s.” 

Knight Ridder’s news account was more specific. It said Mohamed Atta had attended International Officers School at Maxwell Air Force Base in Montgomery, Alabama. In addition, Abdulaziz Alomari had attended Aerospace Medical School at Brooks Air Force base in Texas, it reported, and Saeed Alghamdi had been to the Defense Language Institute in Monterrey, California. 

If true, these reports would have dealt a blow to the consensus portrait then emerging of the terrorist cadre as puritanical Islamic fundamentalists.

According to Wayne Madsen Report, the Mohamed Atta in Alabama was, in fact, the man who became a 9/11 terrorist--and he received training from Doss Aviation:

WMR can now report that one of the pilots Doss trained was Atta. The Egyptian-born pilot and accused Al Qaeda terrorist cell leader was often seen at the officer's club at Maxwell Air Force Base, where he was known as "Lieutenant Colonel" or merely "Colonel" Mohamed Atta of the Egyptian Air Force.

Is it possible that the Siegelman prosecution, the most notorious and flagrant political frame-up in American history, had ties to 9/11? Wayne Madsen says the answer is yes, and we will look at that angle next.


(To be continued)