A 9/11 Story: 5. Mosque and State

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1:00There were just times I just locked the bedroom door and screamed into a pillow. After 9.11, Terry Strader's life is full of sorrow and rage. I had other widows to talk to as a relief valve of the anger, but the kids come first and my anger wasn't something they needed to see or be a part of, or the level of my grief. She's loath to leave her kids. Their dad had gone to work one day and hadn't come back. They're worried the same thing could happen to her. But it's hard to say no to an invitation from the White House. Thank you all. January 2002. Thank you for coming. Four months after losing Tom in the North Tower of the World Trade Center, Terry is among those putting their hands together for President Bush. In the East-Tree of the White House. Please proceed.

2:01Almost everyone is in dark clothes. We've come together today to remember and recognize victims of terrorism. Recognize them and give them some financial relief. The victims of terrorism, tax relief act, is an important example of our national unity and resolve in his my honor to sign it today. God bless. Afterwards, the President mingles. Terry gets a moment. He looked me right in the eyes and said, we're going to get the bad guys. We are going to get them. She takes him at his word. I went home and that's what I told my children. We're going to get the bad guys. But she has questions. Who helped the bad guys? And what can she do to get them? From intrigue on BBC Radio 4, this is a 9-11 story. I'm Jane McMullen, Episode 5, Mosque and State.

3:11A few months after the White House visit, Terry is once again in a room full of 9-11 families. Not the East Room this time, but a hotel ballroom. Coffee, folding chairs, widows, widowers, parents, people just like her, still moving through the fog of what has happened. A friend has told Terry she should come here and lawyer speak. His name is Ron Motley. Ron had the energy that my late husband had and this charisma on the stage. But he was small in stature like my father. In court, Motley is anything but small. He's won billions taking on asbestos manufacturers and big tobacco. Now he wants to investigate who financed Al Qaeda. President Bush has said Saudi Arabia has been nothing but cooperative in the hunt for the bad guys. Ron Motley has a different take.

4:12He said your government is lying when they tell you there was no state sponsors of this attack. He told us that the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia was financing Al Qaeda and that they were financing the September 11th attacks. It's an explosive claim and on that day in the ballroom, it's not proven. But Ron says it will be in court. And it was incredible to hear that there was a way to get answers outside of what my government was telling me. At the back of the room is a sign-up sheet for families who want to join the lawsuit. And I didn't walk to the back of the room to sign up. I ran to the back of the room to sign up. Terry arrived with questions. She leaves with a purpose. Welcome everyone. My name is Ron Motley. August 2002. The lawsuit goes public in a packed press conference in the Marriott Hotel Ballroom in Washington.

5:15And I am lead trial council for this case that was brought this morning on behalf of over 600 families who suffered losses as a result of the atrocities of September the 11th. The suit seeks more than a trillion dollars. It names banks, charities, individuals and governments, all accused of knowingly providing money or support to Al Qaeda. Among them are Saudi charities and three members of the Saudi royal family. Motley is flanked by survivors and families of the dead. Terry's agreed to speak. We must not just speak out against it. We must act out against it. It is in my husband's name, Tom Strata, on behalf of my children, Thomas, Kaitlyn and Justin, in remembrance of his cantor friends,

6:16and in honor of every person that died with him, that I wish to do what I can to bring this to an end. Thank you. She speaks for less than four minutes, but the commitment would last decades. After the press conference, a Saudi spokesman is on TV with a denial. He says the claim is nonsense, neither the princes nor the government ever paid money to Al Qaeda. But among the many names in the lawsuit is one we already know. Omar Al Bayumi. The helpful man from San Diego, arrested in the UK, who said he had nothing to do with 9-11. For Terry, at this point, he's still a minor figure in a vast case. But for some in the FBI, Bayumi is taking on different proportions. That story started almost a year earlier.

7:17I had a whiteboard and I wrote priorities. Los Angeles just days after September 11th. Steve Moore is running the FBI's 400 strong task force. He has just two priorities. One, no smoke on the horizon, meaning LA cannot get attacked if we can avoid it. Number two, what the hell did we miss? Steve appoints two deputies, one in charge of looking for smoke on the horizon, the other in charge of what they missed. A few days later, that agent comes back. And he said, uh, Steve, sit down. I got a brief year on what we found. From his chair, Steve learns the first two hijackers to arrive in the US came in through Los Angeles. They arrived in January 2000, 21 months before the attacks.

8:22They stayed in LA a couple of weeks before moving south to San Diego. And I said, one, we do. Because we didn't know they were there. I said, okay. Um, that was tough. Steve begins to piece together who these men were. The more he learns, the more questions he has. They were not people who could even speak English. They didn't know the culture. They came in saying, what next? The agents discover where the hijackers went after they arrived. Once they were picked up at the Bradley terminal at Los Angeles Airport, the first place they were driven was the King Fahad Mosque. Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. The mosque gives Steve a specific place to look. I found out after 9-11 that the King Fahad Mosque was on the FBI's radar long before 9-11. On the radar, Steve says, for alleged extremist activity.

9:26The King Fahad Mosque was funded by a prince of the Saudi family who had a lot to say about what happened in it. Steve says that agents came to view the chief imam a young Saudi as being aligned with an extremist faction within the mosque. And they learned something else. He's not just a religious leader. He's also a Saudi government official. A registered diplomat with the bland job title administrative officer. This is where Steve's trail leads to Bayumi and his chance meeting with the two hijackers. Because Steve finds Bayumi is there in the consulate. Right before he meets the hijackers. While in British custody in September 2001, Bayumi gave his version of that day.

10:29I went to Los Angeles to first to renew my passport. I wasn't the consulate all there. Bayumi told the detectives how he and a friend traveled up from San Diego to visit the King Fahad Mosque and the Saudi consulate. There, Bayumi said, he met the hijackers by chance. It's a neat story. But for Steve, it raises questions. If what Bayumi said was true, that this was just a chance meeting, that's going to move tectonic plates in an FBI agent's head. Because we don't believe in coincidence generally. But specifically, that wasn't a coincidence. And to me, what that meant is that Omar Al Bayumi,

11:33after a meeting with somebody at the Saudi consulate in my opinion, drove to a specific place to meet specific people that the consulate would have known were there and what time they would be there. Steve's theory is simple, that someone at the Saudi consulate told Bayumi where to find the hijackers. When the trail led to the consulate, it was disturbing. Two Saudi officials keep cropping up in Steve's investigation. The young Imam at the King Fahad Mosque, a Saudi diplomat, and Omar Al Bayumi, the suspected spy. They even met shortly after Bayumi's meeting with the hijackers. Steve shakes his head. This is going to be tricky. We didn't want it to go to the Saudis. That was not convenient. That was not what we wanted to do.

12:38And it was not what we wanted to tell people. Saudi Arabia is a key American ally. President Bush has publicly praised its cooperation after 9-11. The Saudi Imam denies being an extremist or knowing Bayumi. The kingdom denies any involvement in the attacks. For Steve, the next step is obvious. Interview the Imam. We needed to give him a chance to tell us we were on the wrong track. This is the tricky bit. The Imam is also a diplomat. The FBI has strict rules. You can't interview. You can't interact knowingly with the diplomat without the State Department knowing and preferably knowing beforehand. Steve sends the request up the FBI's chain of command. And somewhere there's a problem. We hit a roadblock so hard I think we all had airbag birds.

13:42He asks again, so do others in the FBI. Nothing comes back. That's the same thing as a no in the FBI. Yeah, there was never a time when we were given permission. The FBI and the State Department both declined to comment on allegations in this series. Steve is astonished. The Imam is still in Los Angeles. Almost 3,000 people have been killed in the biggest case in FBI history. And the agents can't even question him. Inside the FBI, Steve is learning how hard it will be to investigate America's Saudi ally. Outside, Terry is beginning to discover the same thing. I'm Jamie Bartlett and for BBC Radio 4, I'll be looking at how fakery took over the world.

14:45No, no, hang on, hang on, sorry. You're not Jamie Bartlett. I'm Jamie Bartlett. A really? Well, who am I then? I'm afraid you're not real pal. You're just an imitation chap, but I created to help me make this series on modern fakery. And why it's everywhere. Sounds good. What's going to be in it? Well, there's a lot. 1980s professional wrestling, dogiacademics, AIS psychosis, COVID vaccine, skeptics. What's it called? Everything is fake and nobody cares with me, Jamie Bartlett. And me, Jimmy Botlett. Listen first on BBC Sounds. Looking for the best of verbo? Discover vacation rentals of the year, top quality homes, guess love from across the country. Our curated list takes the guesswork out of planning, so you can spend less time searching and more time packing. Book your next day now with verbo. Bring me get ringer, make it. Hey, prime members. Grubbub and Amazon have just a thing to help you save.

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