Tearjerking Saga of Mohamed and Megahed

The curious saga of Mohamed and Megahed continues. Poor little innocents detained by the big, bad authorities for merely having "fireworks" in their vehicle.

The St. Petersburg Times weighs in with a real tearjerker today,
via Riehl World View.

Suspicion arrives in Carolina suburbia: The USF students were arrested off the main route, but not in middle of nowhere.

More than a week after the incident, Youssef Megahed, 21, and Ahmed Mohamed, 26, remain in jail in rural Moncks Corner.

The FBI seized the Megahed family computers and searched a Temple Terrace home - one connected to both Mohamed and Sami Al-Arian, a former University of South Florida professor once accused of funding terrorist organizations.

The Goose Creek mayor said Tuesday he has inside information that he can't discuss.

The FBI won't say what, if anything, it has on Megahed and Mohamed. But Wednesday, the agency released a statement reminding the public to withhold judgment, that the allegations could prove false.

Several Tampa lawyers said they'd never seen an FBI statement like it and speculated that the case may be weak. Perhaps the two students had been jailed for carrying nothing more dangerous than fireworks.

The Berkeley County Sheriff's Office adamantly disagreed with that on Thursday.

"We made the proper charges against these people," said Berkeley Capt. Rick Ollic. "We are continuing the investigation. These charges are appropriate."

Megahed's new defense attorney, Andy Savage, saw things differently.

"What has happened to these two young men would not happen to two Irish-Americans," Savage said.

As an Irish-American who has intimate familiarity with Irish-Americans, let me first say I'm deeply troubled by such a sterotype. Still, I must agree with Savage.

We're not stupid enough to be caught driving around near a military base with pipe bombs in our vehicles.

Savage is widely known in Charleston for taking on high-profile cases, including enemy combatant Ali al-Marri, who is held at a nearby military brig. Savage characterized the city as a mostly white, conservative area where the crime rate is low and military ties are strong.

"Muslims are still strangers in that community," he said. "They're still viewed with some suspicion."

Gee, I wonder why...