Rafiq Abdus Sabir is an American

doctor Doctor or The Doctor may refer to: Personal titles * Doctor (title), the holder of an accredited academic degree * A medical practitioner, including: ** Physician ** Surgeon ** Dentist ** Veterinary physician ** Optometrist *Other roles ** ...

convicted of supporting terrorism, for agreeing to provide medical treatment to

insurgents An insurgency is a violent, armed rebellion against authority waged by small, lightly armed bands who practice guerrilla warfare from primarily rural base areas. The key descriptive feature of insurgency is its asymmetric nature: small irr ...

wounded in the US-led Invasion of Iraq. Born in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...

, Sabir was raised by his mentally ill mother after his father abandoned the family. He graduated from

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

and worked as an emergency room physician in Boca Raton, Florida, (including at Glades General Hospital) and

Saudi Arabia Saudi Arabia, officially the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), is a country in Western Asia. It covers the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula, and has a land area of about , making it the fifth-largest country in Asia, the second-largest in the A ...

, paying off $750,000 in medical school debts, living with his

common-law wife Common-law marriage, also known as non-ceremonial marriage, marriage, informal marriage, or marriage by habit and repute, is a legal framework where a couple may be considered married without having formally registered their relation as a civil ...

, Arlene Morgan, and their two sons. He was approached by undercover

FBI The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic intelligence and security service of the United States and its principal federal law enforcement agency. Operating under the jurisdiction of the United States Department of Justice, t ...

agent

Ali Soufan Ali H. Soufan (born 1971) is a Lebanese-American former FBI agent who was involved in a number of high-profile anti-terrorism cases both in the United States and around the world. A 2006 ''New Yorker'' article described Soufan as coming close ...

, who pretended to be a member of al-Qaeda wanting to set up medical care for injured fighters. Sabir was arrested on May 28, 2005, at his home in the Villa San Remo gated community, where he had lived for the previous two years. Sabir is a friend of Tarik Shah, a New York

jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a m ...

musician and

martial-arts Martial arts are codified systems and traditions of combat practiced for a number of reasons such as self-defense; military and law enforcement applications; competition; physical, mental, and spiritual development; entertainment; and the preser ...

expert who was convicted of agreeing to provide training to Iraqi insurgents. Shah pleaded guilty and agreed to serve 15 years in prison and was the one who gave the FBI Sabir's name as a "co-accomplice".

Brooklyn Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...

bookstore owner Abdulrahman Farhane and

Washington D.C. ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, Na ...

cabdriver Mahmud al-Mutazzim received 13 and 15 years' imprisonment, respectively, in the same FBI sting operation. Shah and Sabir swore '' Bayat'' together, though Sabir later claimed that since the oath was simply repeating

Arabic Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C. E.Watson; Walter ...

that was read to him by the FBI agent, he hadn't understood what was being said, and that the agent's primitive Arabic resulted in words like "al-Qaeda" being mispronounced and undecipherable, as demonstrated in audiotapes played for the courtroom. Federal prosecutor Karl Metzner argued that since Sabir had lived in

for several months, he must be able to speak Arabic. Other evidence argued by Metzner included the fact that Sabir was a legal firearms owner. Sabir was found guilty on May 21, 2007, and expressed disappointment with the verdict through his lawyer Ed Wilford. On November 28, 2007, Sabir was sentenced to 25 years' imprisonment, out of a possible maximum of 30. He is incarcerated at

Danbury Federal The Federal Correctional Institution, Danbury (FCI Danbury) is a low-security United States federal prison for male and female inmates in Danbury, Connecticut. It is operated by the Federal Bureau of Prisons, a division of the United States Depar ...

, with a release date of 2027.Bureau of Prisons Inmate locator
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References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Sabir, Rafiq Abdus American emergency physicians Year of birth missing (living people) Physicians from New York City Columbia University Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons alumni American Muslims Living people Prisoners and detainees of the United States federal government American people imprisoned on charges of terrorism City College of New York alumni