Ghazal Modarresi. Please reblog to get justice for Ibragim Todashev Ibragim Todashev was a man in Orlando, Florida, who was questioned about his ties to one of the suspects, Tamerlan Tsarnaev. Todashev and Tsarnaev had met at a boxing gym in Boston and were acquaintance who kept in touch occasionally. On that night May 22, 2013, Todashev’s third interview (and his last) with the FBI, he was shot by an FBI agent seven times and killed. According to the FBI, Todashev was going to sign a confession admitting to his and Tsarnaev’s alleged involvment in a 2011 murder in Waltham, when he suddenly turned violent. The FBI first claimed self defense and that he had attacked them with a knife, later changing it to a sword, a broom, and then finally admitting he was unarmed. However, the FBI then claimed that it was self-defense because Ibragim was trained in mixed martial arts and knowing martial arts in itself could be considered weapon. The media also painted Ibragim as a violent man because of his interest in MMA fighting and that a few weeks before his death, he had gotten into an argument with a man over a parking space. An online article wrote that that his neighbors in Cambridge were intimidated by him because he and Tamerlan sat on the curb “swilling beer and eating chicken on a stoop on Harding Street.” (Boston Herald, Slain Russian Ibragim Todashev ‘intimidated’ former neighbor”) Although the FBI said they would do an internal review of the shooting, some doubt the ability of the FBI to investigate itself. In an article written for the Atlantic, Conor Friedersdorf writes about this, bringing up the fact that “For at least 20 years, its [the FBI’s] inquiries have never found fault with a fatal shot taken by an agent.” (Tavern keepers) Eventually it was brought to light that the FBI had blackmailed Todashev’s friends and asked them to spy on mosques, hookah lounges and other places where Muslims frequented. In an interview with a magazine in October 2013, Todashev’s roommate at the time, Tatiana Gruzdeva, admitted she was held in solitary confinement and questioned the week before Todashev was shot and killed. She was threatened to be deported for staying on an expired student visa and after months of being in prison, was released and allowed to stay in the US for another year. However, shortly after giving the interview to the magazine, the FBI arrested her again, and deported her back to Russia. One friend of Ibragim’s, Ashurmamad Miraliev, was arrested and questioned for an incident that had happened the prior year involving him and Todashev and an arguments with a hookah bar owner. But they did not question him about the incident, instead they grilled him with questions about Ibragim and ignored his requests for an attorney. Additionally, they found he had overstayed his student visa so like Gruzdeva, he was also deported back to his homeland In October 2013, the FBI officially linked Tamerlan to the Waltham homicide, saying that Ibragim had implicated him in the murders shortly before his death and that they had unreleased court documents to prove it. One of the main reasons that Tamerlan was considered a suspect was because he was best friends with one of the victims but he did not attend the funeral. The families of the homicide victims remain unsatisfied with the investigation, especially the sister of one of the victims, who said in an interview “There’s something much bigger going on here.” Many questions arise about the interview and the shooting: Why was he questioned at his home for hours and without a lawyer present? Why did they shoot him seven times if he was unarmed? Last why would they kill him if he had supposedly had important information regarding the bombings or the Waltham homicide? Why not wait to take him to court and prosecute Todashev for his alleged involvement in the Waltham homicide? Ibragim’s father Abduldaki Todashev recently wrote a letter to President Obama asking the sames questions, wanting to know the truth about how his son died. A copy of the letter can be found on this link: rt/usa/todashev-father-letter- obama-998/ Some of the answers we may never know because, he like Tamerlan Tsarnaev, was silenced and died before getting the chance to tell his side of the story. On March 24, two months before the one year anniversary of his death, Jeff Ashton, the prosecutor who was investigating Ibragim’s death, cleared the FBI agent of any wrongdoing, saying the shooting was justified. We, the public, know that the shooting was not justified and we want answers. It’s been nearly a year and Ibragim and his family deserve justice and they deserve the truth. This case has been pushed to the side long enough. Please reblog and share this post everywhere you can
Posted on: Tue, 25 Mar 2014 17:59:42 +0000
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