SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
AP Report: 19-year-old Man Paid by NYPD to "Bait" Muslims
Used "create and capture" strategy, investigation reveals
Oct 23, 2012
A 19-year-old American of Bengali descent was paid by the New York Police Department to "bait" Muslims into incriminating themselves, according to a story published Tuesday by The Associated Press.
Shamiur Rahman ""was under orders to 'bait' Muslims into saying incriminating things as he lived a double life, snapping pictures inside mosques and collecting the names of innocent people attending study groups on Islam," Adam Goldman and Matt Apuzzo of the AP report.
Rahman told Goldman and Apuzzo--and they corroborated through arrest records, text messages and photos--that police instructed him to use a "create and capture" strategy which "involved creating a conversation about jihad or terrorism, then capturing the response to send to the NYPD. For his work, he earned as much as $1,000 a month and goodwill from the police after a string of minor marijuana arrests."
Among his assignments were spying on the head of security at the Masjid At-Taqwa mosque in Brooklyn as he delivered a speech; photographing and identifying people at the event and determining who belonged to the Muslim Student Association at John Jay College and who were its leaders; photographing the 27th annual Muslim Day Parade in Manhattan; and recording license plate numbers and cell phone numbers.
Goldman and Apuzzo reported that they corroborated Rahman's account through arrest records, "weeks of text messages between Rahman and his police handler," and photos Rahman sent to police.
"Former NYPD officials, while not personally familiar with Rahman, said the tactics he described were used by informants," the report states.
After Rahman was arrested in late January for the third time on misdemeanor drug charges, a NYPD officer approached him in a Queens jail and by the next month he was working for the department, the AP reports.
"Rahman said he thought he was doing important work protecting New York City and considered himself a hero," Goldman and Apuzzo report.
He sometimes intentionally misinterpreted statements in order to "please" his handler, Rahman said, noting, "I was trying to get money. I was playing the game."
Rahman no longer works as an informant.
NYPD spokesman Paul Browne did not immediately return a message seeking comment on Tuesday, according to the AP, but he has denied widespread NYPD spying, saying police only follow leads.
An Urgent Message From Our Co-Founder
Dear Common Dreams reader, It’s been nearly 30 years since I co-founded Common Dreams with my late wife, Lina Newhouser. We had the radical notion that journalism should serve the public good, not corporate profits. It was clear to us from the outset what it would take to build such a project. No paid advertisements. No corporate sponsors. No millionaire publisher telling us what to think or do. Many people said we wouldn't last a year, but we proved those doubters wrong. Together with a tremendous team of journalists and dedicated staff, we built an independent media outlet free from the constraints of profits and corporate control. Our mission has always been simple: To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. Building Common Dreams was not easy. Our survival was never guaranteed. When you take on the most powerful forces—Wall Street greed, fossil fuel industry destruction, Big Tech lobbyists, and uber-rich oligarchs who have spent billions upon billions rigging the economy and democracy in their favor—the only bulwark you have is supporters who believe in your work. But here’s the urgent message from me today. It's never been this bad out there. And it's never been this hard to keep us going. At the very moment Common Dreams is most needed, the threats we face are intensifying. We need your support now more than ever. We don't accept corporate advertising and never will. We don't have a paywall because we don't think people should be blocked from critical news based on their ability to pay. Everything we do is funded by the donations of readers like you. When everyone does the little they can afford, we are strong. But if that support retreats or dries up, so do we. Will you donate now to make sure Common Dreams not only survives but thrives? —Craig Brown, Co-founder |
Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel free to republish and share widely.
A 19-year-old American of Bengali descent was paid by the New York Police Department to "bait" Muslims into incriminating themselves, according to a story published Tuesday by The Associated Press.
Shamiur Rahman ""was under orders to 'bait' Muslims into saying incriminating things as he lived a double life, snapping pictures inside mosques and collecting the names of innocent people attending study groups on Islam," Adam Goldman and Matt Apuzzo of the AP report.
Rahman told Goldman and Apuzzo--and they corroborated through arrest records, text messages and photos--that police instructed him to use a "create and capture" strategy which "involved creating a conversation about jihad or terrorism, then capturing the response to send to the NYPD. For his work, he earned as much as $1,000 a month and goodwill from the police after a string of minor marijuana arrests."
Among his assignments were spying on the head of security at the Masjid At-Taqwa mosque in Brooklyn as he delivered a speech; photographing and identifying people at the event and determining who belonged to the Muslim Student Association at John Jay College and who were its leaders; photographing the 27th annual Muslim Day Parade in Manhattan; and recording license plate numbers and cell phone numbers.
Goldman and Apuzzo reported that they corroborated Rahman's account through arrest records, "weeks of text messages between Rahman and his police handler," and photos Rahman sent to police.
"Former NYPD officials, while not personally familiar with Rahman, said the tactics he described were used by informants," the report states.
After Rahman was arrested in late January for the third time on misdemeanor drug charges, a NYPD officer approached him in a Queens jail and by the next month he was working for the department, the AP reports.
"Rahman said he thought he was doing important work protecting New York City and considered himself a hero," Goldman and Apuzzo report.
He sometimes intentionally misinterpreted statements in order to "please" his handler, Rahman said, noting, "I was trying to get money. I was playing the game."
Rahman no longer works as an informant.
NYPD spokesman Paul Browne did not immediately return a message seeking comment on Tuesday, according to the AP, but he has denied widespread NYPD spying, saying police only follow leads.
A 19-year-old American of Bengali descent was paid by the New York Police Department to "bait" Muslims into incriminating themselves, according to a story published Tuesday by The Associated Press.
Shamiur Rahman ""was under orders to 'bait' Muslims into saying incriminating things as he lived a double life, snapping pictures inside mosques and collecting the names of innocent people attending study groups on Islam," Adam Goldman and Matt Apuzzo of the AP report.
Rahman told Goldman and Apuzzo--and they corroborated through arrest records, text messages and photos--that police instructed him to use a "create and capture" strategy which "involved creating a conversation about jihad or terrorism, then capturing the response to send to the NYPD. For his work, he earned as much as $1,000 a month and goodwill from the police after a string of minor marijuana arrests."
Among his assignments were spying on the head of security at the Masjid At-Taqwa mosque in Brooklyn as he delivered a speech; photographing and identifying people at the event and determining who belonged to the Muslim Student Association at John Jay College and who were its leaders; photographing the 27th annual Muslim Day Parade in Manhattan; and recording license plate numbers and cell phone numbers.
Goldman and Apuzzo reported that they corroborated Rahman's account through arrest records, "weeks of text messages between Rahman and his police handler," and photos Rahman sent to police.
"Former NYPD officials, while not personally familiar with Rahman, said the tactics he described were used by informants," the report states.
After Rahman was arrested in late January for the third time on misdemeanor drug charges, a NYPD officer approached him in a Queens jail and by the next month he was working for the department, the AP reports.
"Rahman said he thought he was doing important work protecting New York City and considered himself a hero," Goldman and Apuzzo report.
He sometimes intentionally misinterpreted statements in order to "please" his handler, Rahman said, noting, "I was trying to get money. I was playing the game."
Rahman no longer works as an informant.
NYPD spokesman Paul Browne did not immediately return a message seeking comment on Tuesday, according to the AP, but he has denied widespread NYPD spying, saying police only follow leads.
We've had enough. The 1% own and operate the corporate media. They are doing everything they can to defend the status quo, squash dissent and protect the wealthy and the powerful. The Common Dreams media model is different. We cover the news that matters to the 99%. Our mission? To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. How? Nonprofit. Independent. Reader-supported. Free to read. Free to republish. Free to share. With no advertising. No paywalls. No selling of your data. Thousands of small donations fund our newsroom and allow us to continue publishing. Can you chip in? We can't do it without you. Thank you.