The removal of an attorney from the ISIL recruit case last week has resolved concerns that alleged comments by a member of his legal team could have prejudiced the defense, a federal judge ruled Tuesday.
U.S. District Judge Michael Davis allowed P. Chinedu Nwaneri to withdraw as one of two attorneys for defendant Mohamed Farah on Friday after a weeklong round of debate over the context of teachings by Nwaneri's legal clerk, Hassan Mohamud, who is also a St. Paul imam.
On Tuesday, Davis said Mohamud's involvement would have been unfair to Farah and other defendants, but said Farah's other attorney, Murad Mohammad, posed no conflicts of interest and can adequately represent Farah.
Prosecutors said Abdirizak Warsame, who pleaded guilty in February and has since agreed to cooperate, would be called to testify at trial about his belief that traveling to Syria for jihad "was incumbent on him as a religious duty" — and that he learned about the proper way to pray in battle from Mohamud's teachings.
An informant recorded an April 2, 2015, phone call between himself, Warsame and defendant Guled Omar, in which they discussed how to pray in battle. Warsame said he learned about it from Mohamud, who he said would talk to groups after services at mosques in the Twin Cities.
The disclosure, and subsequent inquiry into whether anyone from Farah's defense team should be disqualified, kicked off a round of court filings, including several from defendants requesting separate trials if Mohamud was allowed to sit at the defense table during the trial, which is scheduled to begin May 9.
Farah's team argued last week that Mohamud's statements were merely theological references to the importance of prayer during hardship and that there was no link to any actions by co-defendants.
But prosecutors said the context of statements cited by defendants, who were getting "psyched up to go to Syria" a little more than two weeks before most were arrested April 19 in Minnesota and California, was important. Davis agreed Tuesday that Mohamud's remarks could not be characterized as "theological or historical comments in the abstract."
