Algerian pilot arrested in terror investigation spent time in Arizona

By Jacques Billeaud

Associated Press

PHOENIX – An Algerian pilot who authorities say instructed four suspected hijackers in this month’s terrorist attacks lived in Arizona in the late 1990s and was in the state as recently as June, records show.

Lotfi Raissi, detained Sept. 21 in London as part of the attacks investigation, held four pilot licenses that listed the address of a Phoenix apartment complex.

Prosecutors in London said Friday that Raissi, 27, was “a lead instructor” of four of the pilots that were responsible for the hijackings and that his job was to make sure that they were “capable and trained for this purpose.”

Prosecuting attorney Arvinda Sambir said in London’s Magistrates Court that Raissi made several trips to the United States this summer, trained with several suspected hijackers and flew with one of them on June 23 from Las Vegas to Arizona. She did not provide details about that flight.

Sambir said authorities believe Raissi helped train the hijackers who crashed a jetliner into the Pentagon.

Raissi held a private pilot’s license with a single-engine land rating, a commercial license with an instructor rating, a student pilot license and a private pilot license with a single-engine land/instrument rating, Federal Aviation Administration records show. The records don’t indicate when he got these licenses or whether he held any of them concurrently.

A federal court in Arizona issued an arrest warrant Thursday for Raissi, accusing him of making a false statement by not disclosing information regarding a previous knee surgery on an FAA form. The warrant made no mention of the terrorist attacks or suspected hijackers.

At least one suspected hijacker, Hani Hanjour, received flight training at CRM Airline Training Center in the Phoenix suburb of Scottsdale for three months in 1996 and in December 1997. Hanjour is believed to have been aboard American Airlines Flight 77, which crashed into the Pentagon.

Another Phoenix-area flight school said a man with the same name as Hanjour used an aircraft simulator in June.

Hanjour’s ties to Arizona go back to 1991, when he took an eight-week English course at the University of Arizona’s Center for English as a Second Language.

Ed Hall, FBI spokesman in Phoenix, declined to comment on whether Hanjour and Raissi were connected.

Other court records show Raissi received a traffic ticket in suburban Mesa in February 1999. The ticket showed as his residence the same Phoenix apartment complex listed on his pilot’s licenses. Officials at the complex declined to comment.

Copyright ©2001 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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