Another Win for Rifqa!

Rifqa Bary moved another step closer to freedom yesterday. FOX has the good news here. The parents' attorney claims they are concerned for her health. These are the same parents who would likely have a headsman there to greet her if she were sent back to Sri Lanka.

Judge: Runaway Christian Girl Not Required to Reunite With Muslim Parents
Published August 05, 2010
Associated Press

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- A juvenile court judge in Columbus, Ohio, has granted a runaway Christian convert's request to declare reunion with her Muslim parents impossible, paving the way for the girl to fight deportation.

Magistrate Mary Goodrich said Thursday that reconciliation between Rifqa Bary and her parents isn't possible before she turns 18 on Tuesday. Goodrich also said it's not in the girl's best interest to return her to her native Sri Lanka.

Bary is an illegal immigrant. The ruling allows her attorneys to file for a special immigration status to allow her to stay in the U.S. while she continues medical treatment following recent surgery for uterine cancer.

Bary fled to Florida last year saying she feared harm for her conversion. Her parents deny she would have been harmed.The immigration status of the parents, who live in the Columbus area, is unclear.

Bary underwent successful cancer surgery in May and then was scheduled for 45 weeks of chemotherapy , which would give her an "80 to 90 percent chance" she'd be fine, Omar Tarazi, an attorney for Bary's parents, told the judge.

Instead, Bary stopped the chemotherapy after two or three rounds, deciding she'd been healed, Tarazi said. In a court filing last week, the girl's parents claimed she stopped after visiting a faith healer.

"The parents are feeling helpless," Tarazi said. "They feel like this is such a critical issue that it be in writing."

Goodrich said she understood why Bary's parents, Mohamed and Aysha Bary of suburban Columbus, filed the request. "I've never gotten the impression they didn't care very much for their daughter," she said.

A letter from Bary's doctor recommending the 45 weeks of chemotherapy indicates she is cancer free for now according to available imaging technology, Bary's attorney, Kort Gatterdam, told the judge.

The letter also says she suffers from a rare form of cancer for which there is no standard treatment.

Rifqa Bary stopped the treatment after becoming sick and in consultation with her doctor, Gatterdam said. He disputed the faith healer allegation, saying Bary had attended a prayer conference after which she continued with surgeries and other treatment.

"Rifqa's not saying she'll never do the treatment again, that she'll never do chemo," Gatterdam said. "She'll continue working with her doctor."

CAIR'S "STAR WITNESSES" IN RIFQA BARY CASE NOW CHARGED WITH EMBEZZLEMENT AND MAIL TAMPERING

UPDATED

From the Astute Bloggers:

A very eye-opening development has come up in the case involving the Global Revolution Church, which betrayed Blake and Beverly Lorenz: Brian Smith, one of the heads of the church, and Omar Tarazi, the CAIR lawyer for the Bary parents, are now facing charges for embezzling and mail tampering. Among some of the details here:

Perhaps the most disturbing element to the crimes committed by Brian Smith, Tom Sanchez and Jeff Parker is that they have illegally embezzled and/or misappropriated funds sent to the church from all over the country by Rifqa's supporters intended for Rifqa’s legal defense fund. The Orlando law firm overseeing her defense fund, Fowler, O'Quinn, Feeney & Sneed, confirmed this week that they have not found any records of EVER receiving any monies from Global Revolution Church sent to the church designated for Rifqa’s legal defense. I have been provided copies of checks sent to the church designated to Rifqa's defense fund, confirming that monies were in fact received, but never forwarded to Fowler, O'Quinn, Feeney & Sneed.

Anyone who sent checks to the Global Revolution Church or transferred money through the church's PayPal account since August for Rifqa's defense is encouraged to contact the Orlando Police Department at 321-235-5300 (complaint desk) to report the funds missing.

The “Judas Three” are also facing federal mail tampering charges. After the trio engineered a church leadership coup and fired the Lorenzs back in September, they intercepted personal mail intended for the Lorenzs sent to the church post office box. Instead of forwarding the mail to the Lorenz’s in accordance with federal law, they sent the mail to CAIR attorney Omar Tarazi, who is representing Rifqa's parents in Ohio. Tarazi, knowing that the mail had been illegally obtained, then attempted to use this purloined correspondence to sabotage negotiations with Rifqa's legal team, making him an accessory after the fact to the Judas Three's felonious mail tampering. Additionally, Tarazi never notified postal authorities of the crime as required of an officer of the court. The mail tampering was attested to in an affidavit submitted to the Ohio court last month by Blake Lorenz (see earlier post)

I expect following this that Tarazi will be disbarred from law practice, and the Ohio court dealing with the case will make sure not to allow CAIR officials to represent any more cases dealt with there. As for Smith and his 2 cohorts at the church, this is truly disgraceful that people in service of the Lord were stealing people's money. It will likely deal a blow to Global Revolution Church's credibility as long as they're under the management of the Judas Three, whom I hope will spend time in prison for assisting in potentially endangering the life of a girl fleeing an abusive family.


UPDATE - Anonymous comments:

Would it not be reasonable to assume that this mail might include letters of support for Rifqa and the Lorenz's, and that SOME of those supporters might well be former muslims themselves or those who are planning a future escape?

And since snail mail typically includes a return address, this situation may be dangerous for more people than just Rifqa...

AOW comments:

How many of us are now on a "special" list? Ugh.

RIFQA BARY DOES NOT HAVE TO MEET WITH PARENTS, AND CAN GET XMAS CARDS

From the Astute Bloggers:

In some good news on this case, an Ohio magistrate has ruled that Rifqa Bary is not required to meet with her parents as part of a would-be reconciliation (via Riehl World View).

And, she can also recieve the Christmas cards sent to her. As FOX reports (via AmerIsrael):

"In the end, she's getting the Christmas cards," Sternberger told FoxNews.com. "They're just making sure there's no white powder or anything in them."

That's understandable! What if some Islamofascists were to take advantage of this and send booby-trapped mail to her? Yes, it is possible they could, so those responsible for the mail call are right to be concerned.

Her next dependency hearing is said to be on January 19th, so while this current news is good, Rifqa is still not out of the woods yet. Let's hope her defense and supporters are ready to campaign for her again when the time comes.

Parents of Rifqa Bary ask court to hold her in contempt to force her to attend counseling sessions with Muslim counselor

Parents of Rifqa Bary ask court to hold her in contempt to force her to attend counseling sessions with Muslim counselor

From Jawa (click on the title above to see the whole thing):

...and the counselor they demand she attend filed an affidavit in support of Rifqa being held in contempt!

The next episode in the legal battle between Muslim-turned-Christian convert Rifqa Bary and her allegedly abusive parents will occur next Tuesday in an Ohio courtroom. As I reported last Friday, one of the issues that will be heard by the court is a motion by the CAIR-appointed attorney to the Bary parents demanding that all Christmas cards sent to Rifqa be banned, and any cards she has already received be seized. On Monday, we provided clear evidence of CAIR's backstage handling of the media in this case.

Another issue next week will be another motion filed by the Bary parents asking the court to hold Rifqa in contempt for refusing to attend counseling sessions with a Muslim counselor. Amazingly, the counselor that the Bary parents are attempting to force her to see filed a affidavit supporting the parents' motion to hold Rifqa in contempt of court. How could this counselor be remotely neutral?

But wait a second - haven't all the media stooges in this case, from Meredith "Hijab" Heagney of the Columbus Dispatch to Michael Kruse of the St. Petersburg Times, insisted that the Bary family intends to respect Rifqa's Christian faith? Haven't these media stooges repeated assurances from the Bary parents that Rifqa has nothing to fear from returning home?

Don't expect these damaging revelations about the parents' duplicity to be reported in the Columbus Dispatch, friends. Behind the veil of sealed court motions the true face of Mohamed and Aysha Bary is being revealed. Her parents have defamed Christians who have attempted to help their daughter flee their abuse; they have filed criminal charges against Rifqa accusing her of being a delinquent; and now they ask the Ohio courts to ban and seize Rifqa's Christmas cards and to force her to see a Muslim counselor that has demonstrated his own partiality. What this long sequence of events clearly shows is that Rifqa Bary has much to fear from being returned to her parents and that they have no intention to honor her personal religious choices.

Hopefully, the courts will recognize what's going on in this case and dispense justice, not political correctness.

Pics reveal CAIR backstage coordination of media in Rifqa Bary case and how the media kept silent

From Jawa Report:

You really need to read all the way to the end to get why this is so important. The pictures do, in fact, reveal a media silent on CAIR's coordinated message about Rifqa Bary. Especially an image of a CAIR computer with a document titled

"DO NOT RELEASE TO PUBLIC" and

"FATHIMA RIFQA BARY TALKING POINTS".
-----

Since early August we have been following the ongoing saga concerning Rifqa Bary, the Ohio Muslim-turned-Christian convert teenager who fled her home to Florida in fear of her life after her family discovered her conversion. Last Friday we reported a motion filed by the Bary's CAIR attorney with the Ohio court considering Rifqa's case demanding a ban and seizure of all Christmas cards sent to her from outside parties. We also broke the story of how CAIR officials were allowed to be present as "neutral observers" when the Bary family was interviewed by Florida investigators.

Early on in this case we reported that the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) had convened a strategy session in Rifqa's hometown of Ohio where they formulated their media strategy in response to the negative press the parents were receiving:

But a source who was inside a secret strategy meeting conducted by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) earlier this week has conveyed the strategy that the media's favorite Islamist group has devised to respond to the ongoing public relations crisis. According to my source who attended the strategy session, CAIR officials handed out copies of this Orlando Sentinel article and want supporters to push the meme that Christians have brainwashed and abducted this gullible teenage girl. They have also instructed supporters to circulate rumors that Rifqa had been carousing with infidel boys and engaged in acts of immorality.

This CAIR strategy takes the focus off the near-universal Islamic legal precepts and Quranic injunctions that demand death for apostates and impugns the character of the innocent girl at the center of this controversy who appears to be in genuine fear for her life if she is returned to her parents.

That media narrative of Rifqa being brainwashed and abducted by a Christian cult was one that was carried by many media outlets, most notably Meredith "Hijab" Heagney of the Columbus Dispatch, Michael Kruse of the St. Petersburg Times, among others. In all their reporting, however, they carefully left the connections of the terror-tied CAIR out of their stories.

But from my source inside CAIR comes new information indicating media complicity with respect to concealing CAIR's backstage management of the case on behalf of Rifqa's allegedly abusive parents. Most of the stories by these media hacks featured pictures of the Bary family, such as this photo accompanying an article by the St. Pete Times' Michael Kruse:

What is important about this photograph is not so much what you see as what you don't see. As the late Paul Harvey said, and now for the rest of the story...

What CAIR's media allies neglected to mention was that these interviews with the lapdog media were being conducted in the office of CAIR-Columbus executive director Babak Darvish as seen in the following photographs taken in various media interviews.

For example, the following photograph shows the Barys being interviewed by a local TV station:

But this next picture shows the same scene panning just a little to the left:

At the very far left you can see Darvish sitting at his desk supervising the interview. And in this next photo you can see the whole scene inside Darvish's office (this one taken at some other time as the Bary's clothes have changed, but the picture above them in Darvish's office, as in the other photos, is still the same):

Here is Darvish sitting at his desk in all his Islamist glory:

And in this last photograph you see the local reporters doing their job. But if you enlarge the photo you can see the document on Darvish's computer - a memo bearing the header "DO NOT RELEASE TO PUBLIC" and "FATHIMA RIFQA BARY TALKING POINTS".

The reason this is particularly important is that if CAIR's media allies, such as Meredith "Hijab" Heagney and Michael Kruse, had let on to the terror-tied CAIR's covert backstage handling of the matter and their parroting of CAIR's talking points would have severely damaged the Bary's claims.

Did Heagney, Kruse or any other member of the lapdog media report that their interviews were being conducted with the Bary family in the CAIR executive director's office? Not a word. Nor should it be any surprise that the media were merely parroting CAIR's false attacks on Rifqa.

We will have more on this media complicity in the Rifqa Bary case later this week.

Who knows? Maybe we might have even obtained a copy of that "DO NOT RELEASE TO PUBLIC" set of talking points?

If the public ever has the opportunity to review the stories by Heagney, Kruse, et al and compares it to the CAIR talking points, much will be revealed.

But these pictures show what CAIR's media allies intentionally neglected to tell their readers/viewers. And as we'll see, there is much that they should be ashamed of in their reporting in the Rifqa Bary case.

A Song for Rifqa

FOX is reporting that the Florida investigators claim to have found "no evidence of a threat" to the life of Rifqa Bary if she returns to her family in Ohio. Hey, no evidence of conspiracy was found at the Noor Mosque ("who, us?"), the Barys deny that they have any intention of harming their daughter ("who, us?"), and Muhammad Bary denies he ever slapped his daughter upside the head for being reluctant to wear the hijab in public ("who, me?").

I hope and trust that Rifqa's legal and support team have been prepared for such a development and that there are still some brave souls amongst the Florida authorities who will not conclude that this relieves them of the responsibility to ensure Rifqa's safety.

I'm dedicating this song, "Braver Than We Are", by Jim Steinman to Rifqa. And to all of us.

"Nice Taqiyyah"

Courthouse Rumble - Robert Spencer from J. Mark Campbell on Vimeo.

The ending is priceless!