"Joe Adams, accidental terrorist, Chapter 2: Adams turns page on mistaken identity"

Saturday, August 2, 2003

Adams turns page on mistaken identity
Joe Adams, accidental terrorist, Chapter 2:
Bob von Sternberg
The Minneapolis (MN) Star Tribune


After spending months trying to get his name removed from the federal
government's airline terrorist watch list, the retired teacher from Cottage
Grove is slightly closer -- if only unofficially -- to knowing how he ended
up on the list in the first place.

It turns out "Joseph Adams" is the pseudonym used by a suspected Al-Qaida
member named Khalil al-Deek, a Palestinian-American who was implicated in
the so-called millennium plot in 1999.

Adams, 71, got no help from the tight-lipped Transportation Security
Administration (TSA) in getting closer to the bottom of his puzzling
inclusion on the department's no-fly list. Instead, the information came to
light as he spent the past week basking in uninvited celebrity.

After his story was published in last Sunday's Star Tribune, Adams was
inundated with inquiries from the news media, and the newspaper was showered
with stories from other travelers who have encountered similar problems --
and a tip from one reader about the Adams-al-Deek link.

Adams, who has been baffled about being on the list, was relieved to hear
there's an apparently rational reason, but he's steamed that he hasn't
gotten the word officially. "It makes sense now, but why isn't the TSA
telling me this?" he said. "Not a word. I'm not going to accept it unless
they put things in writing to me."

Adm. James Loy, who heads the federal TSA, said Friday he understands the
frustration of airline passengers such as Joe Adams who have been mistakenly
pulled aside for scrutiny by airlines and airport screeners. But he
predicted that Adams and others like him "will be the first to vote for" the
new federal screening procedure that is to be tested during the next six
months.

The agency's no-fly list is a computerized compilation of what it considers
"known terrorists or enemies of the United States," in the words of an
agency spokesman. When an airline passenger whose name appears on the list
attempts to check in for a flight, the airline's computer flags the
passenger, who is then further scrutinized.

Adams is a frequent flyer, for both business and leisure, and for nearly two
years, he has been stopped and grilled for as long as 90 minutes most of the
times he has flown. For months, he got no straight answers from either the
airlines -- or even confirmation that he was on the list.

After fruitlessly trying to hack his way through the TSA's bureaucratic
thicket, Adams thought he hit paydirt in May when the agency sent him a
Passenger Identity Verification Form that it said "should provide a more
efficient or streamlined process for you during flight check-in."

It clearly hasn't, so far. When Adams tried to fly from Orlando to the Twin
Cities in early June, he went through another 90-minute bout of questioning
before he could get his boarding pass. Agency officials won't say why it
didn't work, and Adams dreads his next flight, later this month.

Loy said the TSA's new system, which will try to authenticate passengers'
identities when they buy tickets, "will keep us from defaulting to a
position of Joe Adams as a selectee" for extra security inspections.

He also said the TSA will establish a passenger-advocate staff that will
"deal quickly and constructively" with complaints by targeted passengers.

After Adams' story was published last Sunday, a person who read it e-mailed
a tip to the newspaper: He was in the midst of reading "Terrorist Hunter," a
recently published book written by an Iraqi-born woman who worked undercover
investigating terrorist groups and Muslim radicals in the United States. As
a protective measure, she is identified only as "Anonymous."

In the book, she identifies Al-Deek as Joseph J. Adams and links him to a
California-based Muslim charity suspected of funneling money to Al-Qaida.
Although Al-Deek is a minor character in the book, a newspaper database
check showed that the connection between the name Adams and Al-Deek is
abundantly clear.

Al-Deek first surfaced in December 1999, when he was arrested in Peshawar,
Pakistan, on suspicion of plotting to bomb Jordan's main airport in Amman,
one of several attacks worldwide that Al-Qaida had planned to coincide with
millennium attacks around the world.

He denied any ties to Al-Qaida, even though when he was arrested,
authorities seized a CD-ROM containing a 700-page "Encyclopedia of Jihad"
and found that he shared a bank account with Osama bin Laden's chief of
staff.

Al-Deek was transferred to prison in Jordan, where he spent 17 months before
being released without being formally charged in May 2001. Upon his release,
he flew to the United Arab Emirates, traveling under a U.S. passport issued
to "Joseph Jacob Adams."

Joe Adams' middle name is Avery, a name TSA repeatedly and mistakenly used
to identify him. Other differences: He's tall and white-haired, with a
scholarly demeanor, while one press account described Al-Deek as "a pudgy
computer engineer with a taste for wild honey and radical Islam.

Al-Deek's current whereabouts are unknown. By contrast, the world has beat a
path to Adams' door since his story was published. "I've heard from
everywhere from New York to San Antonio to Seattle," he said. "I'm coast to
coast."

Attached Photo:

Joe Adams, a retired teacher, stands outside his home in Cottage Grove,
Minn., on July 17, 2003. He has found himself on the Transportation Security
Administration's secretive "no-fly list," a computerized listing of "known
terrorists or enemies of the federal government," in the words of TSA
spokesman Darren Kayser.

j_adams.jpg