Tag Archives: compound

Police called to Turk cleric’s U.S. compound after shooting report

FILE PHOTO: An aerial view of the Golden Generation Worship and Retreat Center in rural Saylorsburg, Pennsylvania, is seen in this picture taken July 9, 2013. REUTERS/Staff/File Photo

(Reuters) – Police were called to the Pennsylvania compound of Fethullah Gulen, the U.S.-based Muslim cleric accused by Turkey of instigating a failed 2016 coup, on Wednesday after a guard fired a shot at a suspected armed intruder, a Gulen spokesman said.

FILE PHOTO: U.S.-based Turkish cleric Fethullah Gulen at his home in Saylorsburg, Pennsylvania, U.S. July 10, 2017. REUTERS/Charles Mostoller/File Photo

FILE PHOTO: U.S.-based Turkish cleric Fethullah Gulen at his home in Saylorsburg, Pennsylvania, U.S. July 10, 2017. REUTERS/Charles Mostoller/File Photo

The security guard fired a warning shot as the person tried to enter the compound’s gates, and the intruder fled, the spokesman said. There are no known injuries or arrests, Alp Aslandogan, Gulen’s media adviser, told Reuters.

“Just one shot was fired,” Aslandogan said. “The person disappeared. The incident is over as far as we’re concerned.”

Gulen was inside his residence on the compound at the time.

“His response was that the authorities should be informed and everybody should cooperate fully with the investigation to find out what happened,” Aslandogan said.

Several Pennsylvania State Police cars were seen around the sprawling gated compound and retreat in Saylorsburg in the Pocono Mountains, according to photographs shared online by local news reporters.

Police, who left the scene a short time later, did not respond to requests for comment. A local television station, WNEP, reported that police were still searching for the suspected intruder.

President Tayyip Erdogan and the Turkish government accuse Gulen of orchestrating an attempted coup in July, 2016, in which rogue soldiers commandeered tanks and fighter jets, bombing parliament. More than 240 people were killed in the violence.

Gulen denies the accusations.

His compound is patrolled by a team of uniformed private security guards, some of them armed with handguns.

Erdogan has repeatedly demanded that the United States extradite Gulen to Turkey, straining relations between the two NATO allies. Washington has asked for more compelling evidence of Gulen’s involvement in the attempted coup.

A U.S. evangelical pastor, Andrew Brunson, has been held under house arrest in Turkey after authorities charged him with links to Kurdish militants and Gulen supporters, an accusation he has denied. That case has become a key issue in the worsening diplomatic conflict between the two countries, leading to U.S. sanctions.

(Reporting by Jonathan Allen in New York and Matt Spetalnick in Washington; Editing by Alistair Bell)

New Mexico compound member in U.S. illegally over 20 years: government

A view of the compound in rural New Mexico where 11 children were taken in protective custody after a raid by authorities near Amalia, New Mexico, August 10, 2018. Photo taken August 10, 2018. REUTERS/Andrew Hay

TAOS, N.M. (Reuters) – A Haitian woman who was charged with child abuse at a New Mexico compound has been taken into custody by immigration authorities after living in the United States illegally for over 20 years, federal officials said on Wednesday.

Jany Leveille, 35, was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in Taos County on Tuesday and must appear before a judge to resolve her immigration status, according to a statement by ICE.

The immigration proceeding, which could lead to Leveille’s deportation, follows a raid on the compound Aug. 3 in which police said they found 11 children living in dirty conditions with no food or water. Three days later, police unearthed the body of a toddler at the ramshackle settlement north of Taos.

“Leveille has been unlawfully present in the U.S. for more than 20 years after overstaying the validity of her non-immigrant visitor visa,” an ICE statement said.

Kelly Golightley, Leveille’s lawyer, declined comment.

Leveille moved to Brooklyn from Haiti in 1998 after their father died, according to her brother Von Chelet Leveille. She then moved several times between Georgia, Philadelphia and New York, following her separation from her first husband, Von Chelet Leveille said in a phone interview from Haiti.

Leveille had lived at the compound near Amalia, New Mexico since January with her husband Siraj Ibn Wahhaj and children, according to prosecutors. Her six children range in age between 1 and 15, her brother said.

Leveille, Ibn Wahhaj and three other adults at the compound were charged with child abuse on Aug. 8 and their 11 children were taken into protective custody.

The body found at the compound is believed to be that of Ibn Wahhaj’s severely ill 3-year-old son, Abdul-Ghani Wahhaj. Ibn Wahhaj is accused of abducting the boy from a second wife in Georgia in December. Prosecutors allege the boy later died as Ibn Wahhaj carried out a faith-healing ritual on him at the compound.

Prosecutors have accused Ibn Wahhaj of leading firearms training of two teenage boys at the compound to carry out attacks on schools, banks, and police.

Lawyers for the five defendants say they are being discriminated against because they are black Muslims who practiced faith healing and taught their children how to shoot. Neighbors and relatives dispute allegations the children were starving.

A district judge received death threats on Tuesday after she granted bail to the defendants.

(Reporting by Andrew Hay; Editing by Bill Tarrant and Lisa Shumaker)

Five charged with child abuse at New Mexico compound due in court; body of child found

Conditions at a compound in rural New Mexico where 11 children were taken into protective custody for their own health and safety after a raid by authorities, are shown in this photo near Amalia, New Mexico, U.S., provided August 6, 2018. Taos County Sheriff's Office/Handout via REUTERS

TAOS, N.M. (Reuters) – Five people charged with felony child abuse were due to make their first court appearance on Wednesday after 11 children were found malnourished inside a ramshackle compound in northern New Mexico.

The defendants include the father of a missing boy whose disappearance led authorities to raid the compound last week. They also include another man and three women presumed to be the mothers of the 11 children, who were taken into protective custody.

On Monday, authorities found a body at the site believed to be the remains of the missing boy, whose abduction from his Georgia home has been reported by his mother in December. His body was discovered on what would have been the missing child’s fourth birthday, the Taos County sheriff said on Tuesday.

Identification of the remains was awaiting an autopsy. Further charges in the case were possible, local prosecutor Donald Gallegos said.

The compound, surrounded by tires and a trench, is located on the outskirts of Amalia, New Mexico, near the Colorado state line, about 50 miles (80 km) north of Taos.

Each of the five adults were charged with 11 counts of felony child abuse, according to the local prosecutor, Donald Gallegos.

The missing boy’s father, who the sheriff said was heavily armed when taken into custody, was identified as Siraj Wahhaj, 39. According to CNN, Wahhaj is himself the son of a prominent Muslim cleric of the same name in New York.

The second man has been alternatively identified by the sheriff as Lucas Morten and Lucan Morton.

The sheriff declined to answer questions about what was going on at the compound, but he said a shooting range had been built at the property.

(Reporting and writing by Steve Gorman in Los Angeles, editing by Larry King)