toledoblade.com --

Abdul Yassine and his brother, both immigrants from Lebanon, built a successful Toledo business marketing pre-paid cellular phone service regionally.

But shortly after Sept. 11, 2001, Mr. Yassine and brother Mohammed were dragged into a federal investigation of terrorism financing.

The government now concedes they were neither involved in terrorism nor aiding it.

But, in the course of the probe, investigators discovered illegalities in the way they handled large amounts of cash that came into their business.

This week , after being secretly charged in 2003 in a federal indictment that remained sealed for 19 months, the pair will be sentenced for admittedly evading bank currency reporting statutes. Their firm, Page Plus Communications, now T-Page Plus Communications, will forfeit $3 million even through federal prosecutors concede the money was neither derived from illegal activities nor intended for illegal purposes.

"My life was hell for two years," said Mr. Yassine, 35.

Reginald S. Jackson, a prominent Toledo attorney who is representing the brothers, said research by his firm turned up only one other reported case in which the law was applied in a situation involving money not derived from criminal activity such as drug-dealing or money-laundering.

The Yassines' business, which appealed to people who wanted cellular service only in emergencies or who didn't want the hassle and expense of monthly bills, grew rapidly. From 1999 to 2000, sales soared to $15 million annually from $500,000.

The firm, run by the Yassines and three other brothers, quickly attracted 200,000 customers.

Last year, T-Page Plus, and its 70 employees moved from tiny offices on Monroe Street in West Toledo to larger quarters in a renovated carpet store on Reynolds Road near Southwyck Shopping Center.

"I am helping build the Toledo economy," Abdul Yassine said in a telephone interview.

His problems began shortly before Christmas, 2002 - more than a year after deadly terror attacks in New York and Washington - when several federal agencies in Detroit jointly announced a series of arrests, raids, and seizures involving alleged violations of the recently passed U.S. Patriot Act.

The actions were concentrated in the Detroit and the suburb of Dearborn areas but also involved seizure of a bank account of an unnamed business at Key Bank in Toledo.

The same day, Dec, 18, 2002, then-Attorney General John Ashcroft appeared at a news conference in Washington to announce that a senior leader of the radical Islamic group Hammas, his wife, and five cousins were indicted in Dallas for allegedly conspiring to fund terrorism through a Texas computer company. "Just as we will prosecute the terrorists who plant the bomb, we will prosecute the terrorist supporters who write the check," the attorney general said.

Unknown to most outside the Yassine family, the Toledo bank account mentioned in the news release belonged to them. Ultimately, the government, led by the U.S. Customs Service, seized $71,000 from Page Plus.

Thomas Karol, an assistant U.S. attorney in Toledo who is handling their case, said the Yassine brothers were not accused of terrorism or aiding terrorists. "We are making no such accusation," he said.

Still, given the tone of government statements, Abdul Yassine felt as though he was being implicated in terrorism.

Moreover, he wasn't entirely certain about how he became involved in the Detroit investigation.

While his family is Lebanese, the case involved Yemenis and small businesses through which factory workers in the Detroit area passed remittances to poor relatives in the old country. Under the Patriot Act, such agencies were required to register with the government because intelligence officials feared that the unregulated networks might be used to funnel money to terrorists.

Mr. Yassine was not without ties to the Detroit area's large Middle Eastern community. Convenience stores owned by Arab-Americans there were a major retail outlet for phone cards issued by Page Plus Communications, he and his lawyer said.

They often paid in cash - sometimes large amounts of cash.

One customer regularly showed up with tens of thousands of dollars in cash to buy phone cards.

Abdul Yassine recognized that the situation was certainly unusual. But Page Plus was a growing business, and the owners were reluctant to turn away customers.

But the Yassines were doing something else that would land them in hot water. Rather then make a single daily deposit, they would divide the day's receipts into lots, all under $10,000. The brother would then split up the cash and deposit it at different bank branches.

They deposited between $11,000 and $48,000 in this manner on 121 different days over a 2 1/2-year period from 1999 to 2001, the government alleged. The primary motivation, Mr. Yassine insisted, was security. Young tellers tended to joke and make a fuss when they brought in larger amounts, he said. The Yassines didn't want to attract attention from potential criminals.

Additionally, Mr. Yassine said their motivation wasn't to avoid income taxes.

The businessman acknowledged, however, that he was also seeking to avoid the delay and hassle of a currency transaction report that the bank would have been required to complete if the deposit was $10,000 or more. Despite the explanation, the government would later say that the practice amounted to "structuring" transactions to avoid complying with the law. And that is illegal.

The cash transactions continued until October, 2001. That month, one month after terror attacks in New York and Washington, officials of Sky Bank asked the Yassines to take their business elsewhere, according to their lawyer.

The bank did something else, according to Mr. Jackson, T-Page Plus attorney. Officials filed a "suspicious activity report" that was forwarded to the U.S. Justice Department.

Sky has a policy of not discussing current or former customers, and declined comment, said spokesman Tim Dirrim.

Switching to Key Bank, the Yassines found an immediate solution to their problem with cash receipts when an official there suggested that they begin arranging for pick-ups at their offices by the armored car service Brink's, Mr. Yassine said.

Everyone seemed pleased with the arrangement.

But the seizure of company accounts a year later was the first sign that all was not resolved.

Four months later in April, 2003, Mr. Jackson, who had been retained by Page Plus, got a call from Mr. Karol, the federal prosecutor, seeking an immediate meeting.

Arriving at the U.S. attorney's office in downtown Toledo, Mr. Jackson was introduced to a pair of locally based agents from the Internal Revenue Service and Federal Bureau of Investigation, who indicated that they were part of a terrorism task force.

Mr. Karol, the federal prosecutor, then revealed that Abdul and Mohammed Yassine and their firm were the subjects of a secret grand jury indictment in U.S. District Court in Toledo.

The prosecutor declined to specify the charges, but stated that there were 20 witnesses to the activity, Mr. Jackson said. The officials then asked for Abdul Yassine's cooperation in an ongoing investigating of a Page Plus customer.

Mr. Yassine agreed, although he is uncertain about what investigators did with the information.

The 122-count indictment remained secret for 19 months. When finally unsealed in November, 2004, it attracted little notice. All counts relate to allegations that the company and its owners evaded currency transaction reports.

As part of a plea agreement Jan. 31, the brothers admitted to a single count of conspiring to structure bank deposits to evade currency reporting. They are scheduled to be sentenced Friday by Judge David Katz. They could get up to five years in prison and a fine of $250,000. But, given the extenuating circumstances, they will likely be let off with probation, their lawyer said.

The company has pleaded guilty to all counts, and agreed to forfeit $3 million involved in the disputed transactions.

In exchange for not contesting the original bank account seizures, prosecutors agreed to reduce the amount Page Plus otherwise would have forfeited by $71,000.

Their company, which provides cellular service by purchasing huge blocks of time from traditional carriers, continues to thrive. Even though pre-paid cellular has become more common, its customer base has grown to 500,000, Abdul Yassine said.

Contact Gary Pakulski at:
gpakulski@theblade.com
or 419-724-6082.

Permanent Link