A sympathetic account from the NY Times of suspicions gone awry.
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/11/17/national/17CHES.html
November 17, 2001 U.S. Agents Were Doing 'Their Jobs,' 3 Men Say By SARA RIMER
CHESTER, Pa., Nov. 16 — Dr. Irshad Shaikh, this city's health commissioner, who is from Pakistan, says he loves America. He says he understands that the Federal Bureau of Investigation was just doing its job when its agents broke down his door on Tuesday and entered his house with guns drawn, followed by members of a hazardous materials team in moon suits and gas masks.
He says he is not angry that the F.B.I., acting on a tip related to its so-far fruitless anthrax investigation, carried out its raid in the middle of the day on Tuesday, with neighbors gawking and television cameras running, or that among the items the agents confiscated were his computer and his mother's teddy bears.
Dr. Shaikh, 39, who was trained as a radiologist in his country and holds master's and doctoral degrees from Johns Hopkins University, appears similarly unruffled about the several hours of questioning endured by him and his brother Masood, the manager of the city's program to reduce lead hazards for children.
"The F.B.I. can search my house any time," Dr. Irshad Shaikh said in an interview at City Hall today with his brother, who lives with him. The two are both legal immigrants and are eager to become citizens.
Dr. Masood Shaikh, 40, who was trained as a psychiatrist in Pakistan and holds a master's degree in public health from Johns Hopkins, is so eager to accommodate the F.B.I. that he offered to turn over his passport, said the brothers' lawyer, Anthony F. List, who was present for the interview today.
Three days after the raid at the brothers' home and at the home of their friend, Asif Kazi, a city accountant who was born in Pakistan and is now an American citizen, the F.B.I. has charged none of the men. Nor has it provided any detail on what led to the raid, other than to say agents were acting on credible information that they had spent more than two weeks checking out.
The search warrant and supporting affidavits are sealed. But interviews with the brothers and Mr. Kazi indicate that at least some of the F.B.I.'s attention was focused on a pot the brothers carried to Mr. Kazi's house so his wife could prepare a traditional Pakistani chicken and rice dish.
Linda Vizi, a spokeswoman for the F.B.I., said the raid on Tuesday was "not haphazard in any way."
"It was given thoughtful consideration based on the information we had," she said.
The Shaikh brothers and Mr. Kazi, who say they will appear before a federal grand jury on Dec. 20, have denied any wrongdoing. Mayor Dominic F. Pileggi has been effusive in his support of them, as have other city officials.
Like the Shaikh brothers, Mr. Kazi, had only praise for the F.B.I. But he did not hide his distress over what had happened.
"I'm still in trauma," he said. "I cannot sleep properly. I cannot eat. You are worried of the fear of the unknown. What's going to happen tomorrow?"
Mr. Kazi said he had been at work, and his wife, Palwasha, 38, had been home alone Tuesday morning, cooking rice for his lunch in her nightgown, when she saw the armed agents running toward the house.
"They broke the door," he said. "They kept her sitting at gunpoint, in the dining room on a chair. That's the standard procedure. I am not complaining."
Mr. Kazi said the agents questioned him about some Cipro that they had confiscated from his house. Cipro is one of the antibiotics used to treat anthrax.
Mr. Kazi said that the drugs were prescribed by a doctor for his wife, to treat repeated bladder infections.
Mr. Kazi said the F.B.I. also questioned him about a cloudy liquid that he was reportedly seen dumping on the ground behind his home. He said it was soapy water from the washing machine that had backed up into the adjacent sink. "My wife is a maniac as far as washing is concerned," he said.
He said agents had also asked about a large silver-colored canister that the Shaikh brothers, who have been his friends for more than 20 years, were seen putting into their car and unloading at his house.
The canister, Mr. Kazi and the Shaikh brothers said, was a large silver pot that they had brought for Mrs. Kazi to use for her prized chicken and rice dish.
"We are only two," Mr. Kazi said. "We use small pots. She told them, `Bring a big pot from your house so I can cook for you in quantity.' "
The F.B.I.'s search also focused on a health clinic, which will serve AIDS patients and others, that is to open in Dr. Shaikh's house in January.
The clinic will occupy the first floor and the basement, which were previously used as medical offices.
Dr. Howell Strauss, a dentist who runs the nonprofit AIDS group that will operate the clinic, said that renovations on the space began in July, and in the last several weeks contractors have been changing the radiators, and often working into the evening.
Dr. Strauss said the F.B.I. had searched the clinic's space, questioned a carpenter working there, and seized, among other items, a Gatorade bottle filled with glue that Dr. Strauss said had been used to build shelves.
Mr. Kazi, who was hired as city accountant last year, said he had been working on his first city budget when the F.B.I. agents arrived in his office.
"I just want to excel in my career," he said.
Mr. Kazi said that he had never been in trouble, and had only gotten his first parking ticket on Thursday, when he went to his lawyer, Mr. List's, office, in Media, Pa., and did not have enough coins for the meter.
"If, God forbid, I've done something wrong, hang me in the middle of the road. If not, leave me alone."
Copyright 2001 The New York Times Company
-- "Wittgenstein, put down that poker."
John K. Taber