2 USF Students In S.C. Charged With Possession Of Pipe Bomb

By VALERIE KALFRIN The Tampa Tribune

Published: Aug 7, 2007

TAMPA - Prosecutors in South Carolina said two University of South Florida students were carrying a pipe bomb and pipe-bomb paraphernalia when they were pulled over for speeding there during the weekend.

A Muslim advocacy group in Tampa is questioning the criminal charge filed Monday against Youssef Megahed, 21, and Ahmed Mohamed, 24.

The men were charged Monday under South Carolina statutes with possession of an incendiary or explosive device. Both were being held in a Berkeley County jail on Monday. Mohamed's bail was set at $500,000 and Megahed's at $300,000.

A Berkeley County judge considered them a flight risk because they have no ties to South Carolina. The judge ordered them monitored by a global-positioning system if they post bail to ensure they do not leave the state.

Neither man has a prior arrest, records show.

An arrest report shows that Berkeley County, S.C., deputies stopped the men about 5:30 p.m. Saturday traveling 60 mph in a 45 mph zone. Officials said the traffic stop occurred along U.S. 176 in Goose Creek, about seven miles from the Goose Creek Naval Weapons Station. The complex houses a military prison for enemy combatants.

"Was that a possible target of any kind? We don't know," Berkeley County Sheriff Wayne DeWitt said. "A very thorough investigation will be done henceforth, I can tell you that."

The car was driving away from the station at the time of the stop. Deputies became suspicious, DeWitt said, because the men quickly put away a laptop computer and couldn't immediately say where they were going. A laptop was confiscated during the arrest.

The men agreed to a search of the Toyota sedan, where a deputy found what appeared to be an explosive device in the trunk, the arrest report states.

Prosecutors, the Berkeley County sheriff and an FBI spokesman have offered different descriptions of the trunk's contents. The sheriff's office blew up the material it found suspicious.

Authorities won't know definitively what the material was until the FBI completes forensic tests, DeWitt said.

DeWitt said the men claimed the items were fireworks and that it's possible they were. "Based on the officer's judgment at hand and as to what he had seen - we thought it to be other than fireworks," DeWitt said.

Richard Kolko, an FBI spokesman in Washington, told Reuters on Sunday that the men had "some materials to make some pretty good-sized homemade fireworks but not bomb stuff."

Monday, Kolko declined to comment on the case when reached by the Tribune, referring all questions to the sheriff's office.

The Department of Homeland Security is "closely monitoring" the situation through the FBI, according to DHS spokesman Russ Knocke.

Ahmed Bedier, executive director of the Tampa office of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, said the "conflicting information" about the trunk's contents is disturbing.

"We're really concerned about the lack of evidence," Bedier said Monday. "They brought in the bomb squad and detonated the evidence they had. … That was premature to charge somebody and rush to judgment without evidence."

At Monday's bail hearing, Mohamed said the trunk contained fireworks.

Megahed's family told Bedier that the former mechanic is restoring a car and kept tools and oil canisters in the trunk.

Bedier pointed out that no federal charges have been filed. Megahed's friends told Bedier that he left Tampa about midnight Friday to go sightseeing in the Carolinas along Interstate 95. He planned to return to Tampa on Monday.

"It looks like they took 95 and went up the coast," he said.

He likened the situation to a 2002 traffic stop involving three Muslim medical students that shut down Alligator Alley for hours after someone reported the students were suspicious; those students were not criminally charged.

"Obviously their heritage and background is playing a major role in blowing this out of proportion," Bedier said. "If these were some good old boys, … I doubt this [story] would be played around the world."

Megahed works at a mental health clinic, according to information provided at the bail hearing. Ken Gullette, a USF spokesman, said Megahed originally is from Egypt and is a permanent resident of the United States, not a U.S. citizen.

Megahed has attended USF since 2004 and did not declare a major, Gullette said.

Bedier said he takes engineering classes.

Mohamed is a graduate student from Kuwait studying civil engineering, Gullette said. He has attended USF since January.

Records from university police show minor contact with both men, with Megahed reporting this year that a book was stolen from the campus library. Mohamed reported an incident of fraud.

University police filled out a "field contact card" about speaking to each man in a vehicle in the SunDome parking lot at 10:46 p.m. May 25, records show. No charges were filed.

Jassim Aldeen, president of the USF Muslim Student Organization, knows Megahed and said he was stunned by the charges. "He was a very kind person, a bit shy. Everywhere he went, I would see him smiling," Aldeen said. "It is beyond a doubt in my mind that whatever was in that trunk is not explosives. I know his character."

Bedier said Megahed could have been carrying something he did not know would be misinterpreted. He called these trying times for Muslims.

"People have to think twice and three times," Bedier said, "before they go on the road … about what they're carrying, what they're wearing, so they don't attract unwanted attention."

Reporter Timothy Gehret of WCBD-TV in Charleston, S.C., News Channel 8 reporter Jeff Patterson, Tribune reporters Adam Emerson and Josh Poltilove, and The Associated Press contributed to this report. Reporter Valerie Kalfrin can be reached at (813) 259-7800.