I was right, Zeitoun, Ronnie, Nasser, and Todd were arrested! There were five men and one woman, each armed with M-16s and pistols. They forced the four men into the boat without telling them their rights or the reason they were being arrested. They didn't even get a phone call! I thought that was completely unfair. They can't just go around arresting people without telling them the reason! But apparently, the officials believed the four men were al Qaeda. Unfortunately, all of the evidence seemed to pointing against them. Nasser's duffel bag contained ten thousand dollars in cash. He said it was his life's savings. Todd had $2,400 in cash, MapQuest printouts, and a memory card. Todd's job (and he wasn't lying because Zeitoun knew this) was delivering lost luggage from a nearby airport. It never says directly, but I'm guessing that the MapQuest printouts were to the houses the luggage belonged to and the money was his most recent pay. He said that the memory card contained pictures that he had taken of the flood damage. I didn't think that he was lying, but the soldiers weren't buying it.
Zeitoun, Nasser, Todd, and Ronnie were then taken to an outdoor prison called Camp Greyhound. They were kept in cages at all times. Only Todd had been told why they were arrested. They were charged with the possession of stolen goods, but the soldiers that passed by still called them Taliban. The guards treated the prisoners like animals. When the prisoners disobeyed the guards, they were pepper sprayed or shot with a beanbag gun.
They were taken from Camp Greyhound to the Elayn Hunt Correctional Center. Nine days after they were moved there, a missionary came to talk to the prisoners. I thought that this must be the same missionary that had called Kathy because Zeitoun gave him Kathy's number. When he was called in for questioning the next day, Zeitoun asked the official to call Kathy. I wasn't sure if they would. So far nobody else had cared enough to listen to him
A few hours after Kathy had gotten the call from the missionary, a man from the Department of Homeland Security called. He told her that Zeitoun was in Hunt and all of the charges had been dropped. When Kathy called Hunt though, she was told that there was no one there by the name Abdulrahman Zeitoun. Kathy called their lawyer and sorted everything out. He set a court date for Zeitoun's hearing. Kathy had forgotten to ask where the court was and she couldn't reach the lawyer, so she called the New Orleans District Attorney's office. The recording gave her a number in Baton Rouge. When she called that number (this seems like a lot of trouble to go through for a court address), the woman told her they didn't have a court set up. Kathy then asked to speak to a supervisor and he told her that the location of the court hearing was "private information". She argued that it was not private information because it was a public hearing! The next person she talked to said the same thing. I felt exasperated just reading this so I can't imagine how Kathy felt!
When she finally found out where the court hearing was (it was at Hunt), she gathered witnesses to go to the hearing. They waited all morning and were finally told that the hearing was canceled. It sounds to me like they're trying to make it so Zeitoun can't get out without posting bail. Zeitoun however refuses to do this so Kathy and Zeitoun's cousin Adnan, went to find the act of sale for their property. They used their property as bail instead of paying the $75,000.
When Kathy went to get Zeitoun, they drove away as fast as they could. Zeitoun kept turning around to make sure no one was following them. I know that they were doing that so the people in charge wouldn't change their mind, but I think it made them look very suspicious. Even so, Zeitoun was free and everyone was happy. Ahmad was so relieved and Yuko got the kids out of school early so they could see him. I thought that maybe their troubles would finally be over.
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