She Stopped Stealing From The Smithsonian During Ramadan
Aw, how heart-warming -- if it's true. A Muslim employee who stole nearly a million dollars from the Smithsonian parking lot where she worked apparently took time off from disrespecting her employer and taxpayers to show respect for Islam. That is, unless prosecutors just took her word for it. (The article says they "accepted her assertion that she did not steal during the Muslim holy days of Ramadan.") From the AP/Fox:
Freweyni Mebrahtu, 46, of Sterling, was sentenced to two years and three months in prison.When charges were announced last year, authorities said they believed the losses exceeded $400,000 but were unsure of the exact amount.
At Friday's hearing, Mebrahtu admitted she alone stole $895,000 over a three-year period.
She said she did so at the urging of supervisors with parking contractor PMI, who demanded two-thirds of the money Mebrahtu took in.
Going into Friday's hearing, authorities had estimated that Mebrahtu stole nearly $1.2 million, based on length of employment and how much she typically stole each month. But prosecutors accepted her assertion that she did not steal during the Muslim holy days of Ramadan, and revised the loss attributable to Mebrahtu to $895,000.
...PMI officials did not return calls seeking comment Friday.
PMI continues to serve as the Smithsonian's parking contractor at Udvar-Hazy Center, said museum spokeswoman Claire Brown. The contract expires in April, and Brown said the museum will review at that time whether to select a new vendor.
From TheReligionOfPeace.com on the permissibility of theft from the "infidels":
Muslims may not steal from each other. In fact, Muhammad had people's hands cut off for that. But the same is not true of unbelievers. Property rights for them exist only at the discretion of their Muslim rulers. Non-submissive infidels frequently had their property stolen from them by Muhammad's warriors, which sometimes included wives and children....After being chased out of Mecca, Muhammad and his small band of followers sought refuge in Medina, where he was accepted as a mediator between disparate factions. In order to make ends meet, he raided caravans carrying goods from Syria to merchants in Mecca, taking what he wanted and killing or capturing whoever resisted. Aside from establishing the rule that stealing from non-Muslims is permissible, Muhammad's raids also laid a firm foundation for Islamic terrorism.
...Anwar al-Awlaki, a cleric born and raised in the United States and once held up as an example of moderate Islam, instructs his followers not to steal for the sake of self-enrichment, but rather for the cause of Jihad:
"The reasoning behind comparing booty to hunting and wood gathering is because the property which exists in the hands of the disbelievers is not considered to be rightfully theirs in our Islamic shari'ah because of their disbelief and when Islam does give them the right to own it, it is an exception to the rule such as in the case of ahl al-dhimma after they pay jizyah. This is why our scholars say that Allah has called booty as "fai'" which means "to return", so they say that the property of the disbelievers that doesn't belong to them has "returned" to the believer: its "rightful owner."
The justification for stealing from infidels is that they are "at war" against Islam, and any place that is not a Muslim country is considered to be so.
From Wikipedia:
Dar al-Harb (Arabic: دار الحرب "house of war"; also referred to as Dar al-Garb "house of the West" in later Ottoman sources; a person from "Dar al-Harb" is a "harbi" (Arabic:حربي)) is a term classically referring to those countries where the Muslim law is not in force, in the matter of worship and the protection of the faithful and Dhimmis.
Doesn't surprise me, Parking is a huge buisness, in the DC area. Much of it off the record.
Joe J at February 13, 2013 10:22 PM
Not to excuse her behavior, but it seems she was not dishonoring her employers, but ripping off the taxpayer at her employer's urgings.
"She said she did so at the urging of supervisors with parking contractor PMI, who demanded two-thirds of the money Mebrahtu took in"
and
"PMI is a major parking contractor in the D.C. region and holds numerous contracts, including one at Baltimore-Washington International Airport."
The real question is was this corruption at PMI a solitary event at the Smithsonian, or is this some sort of PMI scheme to rip off it's customers (sometimes taxpayers, sometimes private companies) and shareholders?
Unless her supervisors are Muslim, the real problem here isn't Islam, but a culture of corruption at PMI all up and down its ranks.
jerry at February 14, 2013 12:54 AM
Amy Alkon
https://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2013/02/she-stopped-ste.html#comment-3604003">comment from jerryShe said she did so at the urging of supervisors with parking contractor PMI,
You can "urge" me to do a lot of things. I'm not a thief, so urging me to steal won't cut it.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/crime/udvar-hazy-parking-attendant-sentenced-in-scam-that-netted-almost-14-million-in-fees/2013/02/08/6767a6cc-7226-11e2-a050-b83a7b35c4b5_story.html
There's this:
Interestingly, this supervisor has apparently not been charged or named in the article. Now, why do you think that would be?
Amy Alkon
at February 14, 2013 6:05 AM
Wait, Jerry, are you going to take the word of an admitted thief at face value?
I'm pretty sure that the FBI has forensic accountants that are pretty good at following the money. Wonder what they found? did they find the money going to supervisors? if so, are further indictments coming?
I R A Darth Aggie at February 14, 2013 6:44 AM
It's likely my hatred of these enormous parking lot companies got the better of my reading skills at 3am, but yes, I found the tone of the AP report to be suggesting along with statements that PMI wouldn't talk to the reporter, that further indictments would be forthcoming.
jerry at February 14, 2013 1:00 PM
Leave a comment