Eastern District Court Judge Sterling Johnson on Tuesday denied a petition by the Guyanese charged with a series of insurance scam murders in Guyana and the US, to suppress a reference to 9/11 mastermind Osama Bin Laden.
The reference to Bin Laden was recorded during the government's surveillance of a conversation between accused Richard James and an informant.
James had made the petition through his lawyers but when the matter came up before the judge he denied the application. James and his co-accused Ronald Mallay were both trying to block taped conversations in which they allegedly plotted the death of their victims. They contended that there was a complete "lack of relevance" to issues of charge, and admission of the reference "substantially outweighs" any marginal cumulative assistance to the case.
According to the government's transcript, James tells a wired informant, Derek Hassan: "The mistake that Bin Laden did the other day when he sent a F@#$ing plane at Rockaway, I wanted him to send it at Liberty Avenue from Lefferts to 130."
US District Attorney, Roslyn Mauskopf argued that the comment was relevant because it was direct evidence of the scope of the fraud. She said the statement provided an insight into James's motivation and the ease with which he contemplated the deaths of innocents for his profit.
James, 46, and Mallay, 61, could face the death penalty if convicted on federal murder charges for the deaths of four people.
Investigators said the duo may have killed several more people in a scheme to collect hundreds of thousands of insurance policies the victims never knew about.
James, a former insurance agent known for hosting a cable television show featuring Guyanese music and dance, and Mallay, an ex-postal worker, have been formally charged with the poisoning and shooting deaths of four people, two in the United States and two in Guyana, since the 1990s.