Unproven allegations

Submitted by Brenda Walker (United States), Jan 24, 2003 at 21:06

It is regrettable that Daniel Pipes began this important article with a series of baseless allegations put forth by a convicted felon. Ayub Ali Khan was interviewed in India by the Washington Post (A 'Long Night of Terror' After 9/11), and there was no corroborating evidence presented to prove his many complaints about mistreatment in American jails. He was convicted of credit card fraud and selling false documents, then served time and was deported, so he is not exactly credible.

The Post has presented a disturbing number of sob stories from illegal aliens, even after 9/11, and this example was even worse than normal. Presumably, such sniffle journalism pieces are very easy to write -- no annoying research -- and make the paper seem concerned with social justice. I wrote a letter in response to just this article, suggesting that the Post consider publishing a prison edition, since they have such solicitude for downtrodden criminals, but it has not been printed just yet. Oh, well!

There may be mistreatment of prisoners in American jails, but the Post article about Mr. Khan did not convince me of it in this case. I do wish that Mr. Pipes had chosen a better example for the evils of profiling, if that was the point of this curious beginning to an otherwise excellent article.

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