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by Kathleen Walter
WPTV 5 (West Palm
Beach), October 7, 2002
Tonight, questions about a possible connection to the
worst day in American history. Did an admitted con-man turned informant
tip authorities, including a state senator and a U.S. senator, to a
threat against the World Trade Center? News Channel Five's Kathleen
Walter is joining us with the result of a News Channel Five
investigation tonight. Kathleen.
KATHLEEN WALTER: Well, Jim, Randy Glass is a man with a
criminal past, but someone the government trusted enough with very
sensitive and classified intelligence information. There is no dispute
he was wired into international arms dealers and may have heard about
terrorist threats to the United States. What did a local, and a U.S.,
senator do with the information he says he passed along?
WALTER: [?] of the unthinkable. Terrorists using
airplanes as deadly weapons to attack the Pentagon and the World Trade
Center. But to Randy Glass, the idea that terrorists wanted to bring
down the Twin Towers came as no surprise to him.
RANDY GLASS: I felt incredibly uncomfortable, because I
knew that something was going to happen.
WALTER: For more than two years, Glass was caught up in
an international arms deal. An admitted con-man living in Boca Raton,
Florida, Glass put his skills to work for the government, an informant
for the FBI and Florida's Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms, Glass and other
agents posed as illegal arms dealers, [hawking?] arms purportedly
diverted from U.S. military armories and luring in prospective weapons
buyers who might have been linked to terrorism. His life as a secret
agent was chronicled on tape.
GLASS (TAPE): What would you do?
MOHSSEN (TAPE): I'll kill him! I'll kill you!
Through accused middle man Diaa Mohassen [Mohsen], Glass
was introduced to weapons buyers who said they had connections to
Islamic militant groups, with possible links to Osama bin Laden.
MOHSSAN (TAPE): You know who supplies them with money?
GLASS (TAPE): Who?
MOHSSAN (TAPE): Osama bin Laden.
GLASS (TAPE): That's very nice. Thanks for mentioning
that.
GLASS: Americans were the enemy, and that the purpose of
attaining these weapons systems and nuclear materials was to use against
Americans.
WALTER: And Glass says threats against Americans didn't
end there.
GLASS: I did know that there was a plan of attack on the
United States, and the World Trade Center had been mentioned.
WALTER: But in the summer of 2001, Glass' undercover work
came to an end. Three months before September 11th, he reached out to
Florida state senator Ron Klein, and told him about threats against
national security. Klein says he does not recall any mention of World
Trade Center threats.
STATE SEN. RON KLEIN: This is before September 11th and
all that. Um, again it was enough information for me to say I don't know
exactly what to do with this other than to contact one of my federal
colleagues.
WALTER: And so state senator Ron Klein contacted the
office of Florida senator Bob Graham, the chair of the Senate
Intelligence Committee.
WALTER: According to Graham's spokesperson, Jill
Greenberg, caseworker Charlie [?] spoke with Graham last summer prior to
September 11th, Glass claiming he had at least six conversations with
the caseworker. And while we have been unable to corroborate the nature
of those conversations, Greenberg confirmed that some of that
information was passed along to the Senate Intelligence Committee.
REPORTER: A few months before September 11th, your office
received information from ATF informant Randy Glass, who also worked on
the terrorism task force, and he also advised your office of terrorist
intentions to bring down the World Trade Center. And this was before
September 11th.
BOB GRAHAM: Mhmm. (Nods.)
REPORTER: Your office tells me it forwarded information
from Mr. Glass to the Intelligence Committee, and my question is: why
did no one from the Committee follow up with Mr. Glass to pursue this?
GRAHAM: Well, because we in turn gave that information to
the appropriate intelligence agency. We are an oversight and legislative
agency. The actual operations of collection of information, interviewing
possible sources, is the responsibility of the FBI if it's a domestic
matter, or the CIA if it's foreign.
WALTER: And according to state senator Klein, three weeks
after he made initial contact with Senator Graham's office in the summer
of 2001, staffers there confirmed to him Glass' information had been
passed on to the intelligence community.
REPORTER: They confirmed to you that they'd sent it on?
KLEIN: (Nods). Yep. Mhmm. They said to me that they had
spoken...that they had processed it through their office and spoken to
Randy is I believe what they said, and processed it.
GRAHAM: I had a concern about that and a dozen other
pieces of information which were emanating in the summer of 2001.
REPORTER: So you did forward Mr. Glass' information
along, to who?
GRAHAM: Yep. I cannot say what agency, but the agency
that we felt was the most appropriate one for the nature of the
information that he was providing.
WALTER: Despite his keen insight into the world of
terrorists, Randy Glass says that until recently no one from any
intelligence agency had contacted him. And since our interview with
Senator Graham in Boca Raton last month, his office offered this
clarification, that "Mister Glass didn't provide any information to our
office prior to Sept. 11 2001 that needed to be pursued by intelligence
agencies. When I was interviewed in Boca Raton, I said I did know of
this individual and that he had been in touch with the Intelligence
Committee, but I didn't indicate when that contact had taken place. It
was earlier this year, not prior to Sept. 11, 2001."
WALTER: Even though Graham's press aid Jill Greenberg and
state Senator Klein say Glass' information did go to the intelligence
community prior to September 11, 2001, the Senator still maintains
that's not the case, even though that's what he initially told us. Jim.
JIM: Kathleen, a lot of information to digest, but do we
know exactly what information did go to the senator?
WALTER: Well, at the end of the day, we just don't know.
We called Graham's staffer Charlie [?] several times to find out more
about his conversations with Mr. Glass, but he did not return our phone
calls. We are still investigating and hope to have answers in the coming
weeks.
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