Feds question man linked to anti-Islamic film that sparked protests
BY ASSOCIATED PRESS
September 15, 2012 6:24PM
Nakoula Basseley Nakoula, 55,
who is linked to the anti-Muslim movie that has inflamed the Middle
East, is escorted by Los Angeles County sheriff's deputies from his home
early Saturday in Cerritos, Calif. He was questioned but not arrested.
| CBS2-KCAL
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LOS ANGELES — A Southern California
filmmaker linked to an anti-Islamic movie inflaming protests across the
Middle East was interviewed and released Saturday by federal probation
officers at a Los Angeles sheriff’s station, authorities said.
Nakoula
Basseley Nakoula, 55, was interviewed for about half an hour at the
station shortly after 12 a.m. in his hometown of Cerritos, Calif., said
Steve Whitmore, spokesman for the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s
Department.
After that, deputies dropped Nakoula off at an undisclosed location.
“He is gone. We don’t know where he went,” Whitmore said. “He said he is not going back to his home.”
Federal officials are investigating whether
Nakoula, who has been convicted of financial crimes, has violated the
terms of his five-year probation. If so, a judge could send him back to
prison.
Nakoula went voluntarily to the station, wearing a
coat, hat, scarf and glasses that concealed his appearance. His home has
been besieged by media for several days.
Whitmore said Nakoula was not handcuffed and the heavy apparel was his idea.
The probation department is reviewing the case of
Nakoula, who pleaded no contest to bank fraud charges in 2010 and was
banned from using computers or the Internet or using false identities as
part of his sentence.
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Federal authorities have identified Nakoula, a
self-described Coptic Christian, as the key figure behind “Innocence of
Muslims,” a film denigrating Islam and the Prophet Muhammad that ignited
mob violence against U.S. embassies across the Middle East.
Much of the film was shot inside the offices of
Media for Christ, a nonprofit based in the Los Angeles-area city of
Duarte. The charity raised more than $1 million last year “to glow
Jesus’ light” to the world.
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The Riverside County man who was a script adviser
to the film and who has a long history of anti-Islamic activism told the
Press-Enterprise newspaper that he has received multiple death threats.
“I’m really tired,” Steven Klein said when he
answered the door of his home in Hemet, Calif., Friday with a pistol in
his hand and clad only in a pair of white shorts stained with what
appeared to be ink spots.
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The newspaper said Klein, a Vietnam veteran,
appeared agitated. While waving the gun, he told the newspaper he was
standing up for his First Amendment rights in helping with the film and
said he is prepared to die for those rights.
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A federal law enforcement official said authorities
had connected Nakoula to a man using the pseudonym of Sam Bacile who
claimed earlier to be writer and director of the film.
Violent protests set off by the film in Libya
played a role in mob attacks in Benghazi that killed U.S. Ambassador
Chris Stevens and three other American officials. Demonstrations against
American missions have since spread to several other countries.
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