WASHINGTON — The two senators who honored flight instructors for alerting authorities to Zacarias Moussaoui before the Sept. 11 attacks are asking why the men were left off a $5 million government reward given to another tipster.
Clarence Prevost, 69, got the payout Thursday, when he was honored in a private ceremony as part of the State Department’s “Rewards for Justice” program, which mainly seeks information about perpetrators or planners of terrorist acts against U.S. interests and citizens abroad.
But two of Prevost’s former colleagues at the Pan Am International Flight Academy outside Minneapolis are questioning the reward, especially after a 2005 Senate resolution commended their “bravery” and “heroism” for alerting the FBI about a month before the attacks.
The Minnesota senators who sponsored that resolution, Republican Norm Coleman and now-retired Democrat Mark Dayton, want answers from the State Department.
“There is no question that both Tim Nelson and Hugh Sims are American heroes,” Coleman said Friday, adding that any honor given by the government should go to those two men as well. “I have contacted the State Department to determine why these heroic men were not recognized for their roles, and see what can be done to ensure they receive the credit they are due.”
Dayton said: “I don’t know what Mr. Prevost did, but I know what the other two did, and if there’s an award, it ought to be equitably distributed. This is typical of this administration. They do something in secret and don’t discuss it. An explanation is warranted.”
Dayton’s successor in the Senate, Democrat Amy Klobuchar, wrote a letter to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Friday asking why Prevost was selected while Nelson and Sims were not.
State Department deputy spokesman Tom Casey said Friday that the Rewards for Justice program is based on nominations, and the recipient would have been nominated by a U.S. law enforcement agency. He said he didn’t know if others were nominated for this award.
Prevost, a former Navy pilot who goes by the nickname “Clancy,” became a key witness at Moussaoui’s trial and eventual conviction as a Sept. 11 conspirator. Prevost testified that he urged his bosses at the Pan Am International Flight Academy outside Minneapolis to call the FBI in August 2001 because he was suspicious of Moussaoui, an inexperienced pilot seeking commercial jetliner training.
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