A Kirkland man was deported to Iraq Sunday for ties to Al Qaeda after a federal immigration judge deemed him a national security risk.

An Iraqi refugee, Sam Malkandi, 51, was jailed nearly five years in a federal detention center in Tacoma while awaiting deportation.

Malkandi was living in Kirkland in 1999 when he attempted to fraudulently obtain a U.S. visa for a Yemeni man, Tawfiq bin Attash, to receive medical treatment. Bin Attash – a former bodyguard of Osama bin Laden currently imprisoned at Guantanamo Bay – is suspected of planning the 1998 U.S. Embassy bombings in Africa and the attack on the USS Cole in Yemen in 2000.

Evidence linking Malkandi to Al Qaeda surfaced in 2003 after bin Attash was captured in Pakistan and turned over to U.S. authorities. A subsequent investigation by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and FBI agents determined that Malkandi had made arragements with a Bellevue clinic for bin Attash to obtain a new prosthetic foot in 1999. Bin Attash was unable to come to the United States as his visa application was denied.

Malkandi was arrested in 2005 on grounds that he committed fraud against the U.S. government in order to obtain immigration benefits for himself and his family. No criminal charges were filed.

During Malkandi’s hearings before a federal immigration judge, ICE attorneys linked Malkandi to bin Attash and argued that there were reasonable grounds for regarding Malkandi as a threat to national security.

However, Malkandi said he did not realize his friend, bin Attash, was a terrorist.

ICE attorneys also claim that Malkandi committed fraud against the U.S. government, falsely claiming he was incarcerated in Iran for the possession of banned religious and political books to obtain immigration benefits.

But his family and supporters say Malkandi falsified his asylum application to boost the family’s chance of escaping a Pakistani refugee camp.

Originally known as Sarbaz Abulgani Mohammad, Malkandi entered the United States as a refugee with his wife, Mali, and his son and daughter in 1998. He changed his name to Sam Malkandi in 2001 and the family adopted the Christian faith.

Granted permanent asylum in 2006, Mali and her children have been trying to naturalize as U.S. citizens for years, while Malkandi was confined at the Federel Detention Center in Tacoma after an immigration judge ordered his deportation in 2006.

Five-year plea for mercy

“He didn’t do anything except love America,” said Mali, who says her husband is innocent. Mali and a group of supporters, including the Arab American Community Coalition, have contacted media outlets and local legislators, lambasting ICE for its treatment of Arab Americans. In a press release, the coalition claims Malkandi is a “pawn in our politics of insecurity.”

During a phone interview with the Reporter Thursday, Mali recalled when she and her 12-year-old son, Arvin, visited Sen. Patty Murray’s office.

“My son cried,” he said. “I need my dad for basketball practice,'” she said. “But everybody closed their eyes. Patty Murray closed her eyes. Everybody is scared of ICE.”

Mali added that her family fled to the U.S. in pursuit of the American dream.

“I always read about America and was always in love with America,” said Mali, who is originally from Iran. “I came as a refugee and my dream came true. But I got hurt. It’s such a shame for me to tell my family that my country deported my husband.”

Mali did not know that her visit with Malkandi on Sunday would be her last. Through a thick window, Arvin talked to his father on a telephone. He stood on a chair and showed his father his new basketball shoes.

“Arvin told Sam, ‘When you are free, you can see better my shoes,'” Mali said. “Oh, it makes me cry.”

She learned of her husband’s deportation on Monday, when a prisoner from the detention facility called her to tell her the news.

“I remember that morning I wanted to make coffee and I just started bawling,” said Mali, who noted Malkandi called her on Tuesday to let her know he was in Iraq. “My husband used to wake up early and make me coffee. It’s so hard for me.”

It was difficult for her to tell her son and 22-year-old daughter, Nicole, a student at the University of Washington, about their father. She said her son has cried all week, can’t eat food and sits in his room.

Mali, who lives in the Juanita neighborhood with her son, said she will continue to work as a dental assistant and take care of her children.

“The main thing is I love my God and I’m thankful I have beautiful kids and I’m safe,” she said. “There are so many nice things in America and it breaks my heart about my husband, but this is life. I have to keep going. One day maybe I’ll see my husband.”