Cleric found guilty of racketeering in corruption trial
By JOANN LOVIGLIO, Associated Press Writer, The Associated Press June 14, 2005

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A prominent Muslim leader on Tuesday was convicted of using his political connections to obtain dubious loans, donations and city contracts _ the latest in a string of wins for federal prosecutors who have attacked the so-called "pay to play" culture in Philadelphia's city government.

The investigation has led to the convictions and guilty pleas for more than a dozen people, including a former city treasurer, two bank executives and several business owners seeking city contracts.

The probe became public when police discovered an FBI bug in Mayor John F. Street's office. The mayor has denied any wrongdoing and has not been charged.

Shamsud-din Ali, the leader of a West Philadelphia mosque, was charged with 34 counts, chief among them a racketeering charge. After six days of deliberations, jurors found him guilty of 22 of those counts, including the racketeering charge. They found him not guilty of four counts and couldn't reach a verdict in eight counts.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Frank Labor said the government was pleased with the verdict.

Ali, who is to be sentenced Sept. 19, would likely face a minimum sentence of four to five years in prison, Labor said.

The government contended that Ali led a criminal enterprise that generated tens of thousands of dollars through extortion, bribery and political connections.

Federal prosecutors outlined eight scams they alleged were perpetrated by Ali, with victims of extortion or fraud including the city, Community College of Philadelphia, a bank, a car dealership and two waste-hauling companies that were seeking city contracts.

The government suggested that the city gave Ali a "money for nothing" commission for his political support of Street, calling it a "loss to the city ... $60,000 thrown out the window, given to a man who didn't do the work."

Ali's lawyer, James Binns, argued that the city never spelled out the minimum work required by the mayoral friend and fundraiser to earn a $60,000 commission in a delinquent property tax case. Binns did not immediately return a call seeking comment Thursday.

A co-defendant, businessman John Johnson, was convicted of charges he extorted waste-hauling companies seeking city business.

Another, former mayoral aide John Christmas, was acquitted of charges he aided in the property-tax collection scheme and the jury was hung on a charge that he lied to a grand jury about his role.

Ali, 67, who favors expensive suits and fancy cars, had served six years in prison for killing a minister during a robbery. At the time, he was known as Clarence Fowler; the conviction was overturned in 1976.

According to prosecutors, he and his wife, Faridah, used the Muslim school they ran as a private piggy bank, soliciting donations and public education funds for adult education classes that were never held. The Alis had at least five family members on the payroll, including two adult children who lived out of state.

Faridah Ali was convicted and sentenced to a year of house arrest on related charges.

The trial, which began on April 21, is the fourth in a string of public corruption trials in Philadelphia. The jury began its deliberations on June 7.

As his racketeering trial got under way, Ali pleaded guilty to four counts of income tax evasion for not filing returns from 1998 to 2001.

SHAMSUD-DIN ALI, FARIDAH ALI, AND FIVE OTHERS CHARGED IN CONNECTION WITH RACKETEERING ENTERPRISE

Also Charged Are Former Special Assistant to the Chief of Staff For The Mayor Of Philadelphia and Chief Of Staff For City Councilperson

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PHILADELPHIA – United States Attorney Patrick L. Meehan, Special Agent-in-Charge John Eckenrode, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Special Agent-in-Charge Jerome Lisuzzo, Internal Revenue Service, and Special Agent-in-Charge William Hamel, Inspector General's Office, Department of Education, today announced the filing of an Indictment,1 charging defendants Shamsud-Din Ali, a/k/a "Shamps," "the Imam," and Faridah Ali, a/k/a "Rita Spicer," "Rita Ali," with conducting and participating in a racketeering enterprise through a pattern of racketeering activity involving numerous schemes to obtain money and property by defrauding governmental entities, financial institutions, businesses and individuals; extortion; and bribery.

"This enterprise used political influence as leverage and access to people in high places as a hammer," said Meehan. "This organization wrapped its tentacles around individuals, institutions, government entities or whomever it targeted as a source of profit, and simply applied pressure when necessary. Taxpayers wound up stuck with the bill for work that was never done. Banks were defrauded, vendors were extorted, and even contributors to a religious school were duped."

Specifically, the 48-count RICO Indictment alleges that Shamsud-Din Ali and Faridah Ali exploited their positions of control over various individuals and related legal entities, including Keystone Information and Financial Services ("KIFS"), located at 7108 Germantown Avenue, Philadelphia, PA, and the Sister Clara Muhammad School, a private school for grades K-12 located at 4700 Wyalusing Avenue, Philadelphia, PA, to generate illegal income. The Indictment also charges five individuals, John Christmas, Steven Vaughn, a/k/a "Wassi," Richard Meehan, John Johnson and John Salter, with various substantive crimes stemming from their participation in the affairs of the RICO enterprise directed and controlled by the ALIs, including mail fraud, wire fraud, interstate travel and use of the mails in aid of racketeering, and extortion. The Indictment charges that at the time of the commission of the offenses John Christmas was the Special Assistant to the Chief of Staff for the Mayor of Philadelphia and Steven Vaughn was the Chief of Staff for the City Councilperson elected to represent the Eighth District for the Philadelphia City Council.

The violations charged in the Indictment include the following:

The Scheme to Defraud the City of Philadelphia - KIFS' Collection Contract with the City of Philadelphia

The Indictment charges that from May 2001 through April 2002, Shamsud-Din Ali, together with John Christmas and Steven Vaughn, both of whom were employed by the City of Philadelphia, conducted a scheme to defraud the City of Philadelphia ("COP" or "the City") by falsely representing to the Law Department for the City of Philadelphia that Shamsud-Din Ali's debt collection company, KIFS, had identified and collected $658,000 in delinquent real estate taxes owed to the COP, when in fact KIFS had provided no services. On August 14, 2001, in a telephone conversation with Christmas, Ali said they should "give me the whole thing." As a result of the false representations to the COP, the COP paid KIFS a $60,595 commission.

Commercial Bribery and Interstate Travel in Aid of Racketeering - KIFS and The Airport Contract

The Indictment charges that between July 1999 and October 2003, Shamsud-Din Ali agreed to pay and paid Richard Meehan, then the National portfolio manager for AAT Communications Corporation, more than $7,000 in kickbacks for using his position at AAT to ensure that KIFS was a minority participant on a contract between AAT and the City of Philadelphia to install, lease and manage cellular antenna sites at the Philadelphia International Airport ("Airport"), thereby ensuring that KIFS would earn monthly commissions of approximately $1,700 per month from AAT without having to perform any work on the Airport contract.

The Scheme to Defraud Commerce Bank - KIFS' Line of Credit

The Indictment charges that between Fall 2001 and August 2003, Shamsud-Din Ali and John Salter, a tax preparer, engaged in an scheme to defraud Commerce Bank by preparing and submitting false financial documents to Commerce Bank which gave a false picture of KIFS financial condition so that Commerce Bank would: 1) not foreclose on a $100,000 line of credit that had been extended to KIFS in 1999 and was guaranteed by the Small Business Administration; and 2) extend the loan maturity date for the $100,000 line of credit until August 2003.

Extortion of City of Philadelphia Vendors

The Indictment charges that between July 2002 and November 2002, Shamsud-Din Ali and John Johnson engaged in a scheme to extort $25,000 from Waste Management & Processors, Inc., a bio-solid waste hauling business which had a contract with the City of Philadelphia to haul and dispose of biological solids generated by the Philadelphia sewage treatment system. In a telephone conversation on October 15, 2002 with Ali, Johnson said of his victim, "I think he knows he has to pay us; he doesn't want me complaining to the City; if he's going to cooperate, he'll have to keep this group here happy. He sees the power." In another telephone conversation with Johnson less than a month later, Ali said he was not "gonna let no coward play with me" and that Ali would "turn on him ferociously." Additionally, the Indictment charges that Shamsud-Din Ali and John Johnson attempted to extort another waste hauling company, Waste Management of Pennsylvania, Inc., between January and February 2003.

The Scheme to Defraud Contributors to the Sister Clara Muhammad School

The Indictment charges that between January 1998 and December 2001, Shamsud-Din Ali and Faridah Ali engaged in a scheme to defraud contributors to the Sister Clara Muhammad School by representing that the contributed funds were going to be used for the Sister Clara Muhammad School, when in fact the funds were used for personal expenses for Shamsud-Din and Faridah Ali. Through their misrepresentations, the ALIs obtained approximately $75,375 in funds which contributors believed were going to be used for the school.

The Scheme to Defraud the Community College of Philadelphia (Mail Fraud)

The Indictment charges that between July 1999 and December 2001, Faridah Ali engaged in a scheme to defraud the Community College of Philadelphia ("CCP") by making false and fraudulent representations which caused the CCP to pay at least $21,600, to SCMS, as payment of rent for the use of the SCMS facility to conduct courses on behalf of the CCP, which in fact were not taught at the SCMS. The rent monies were then diverted to the personal use and benefit of Shamsud-Din Ali and Faridah Ali.

The Scheme to Defraud Mercedes-Benz

The Indictment charges that between July 2001 and August 2001, Faridah Ali and Shamsud- Din Ali engaged in a scheme to defraud Cherry Hill Mercedes-Benz and Mercedes-Benz Credit Corporation by submitting false and fraudulent financial information to obtain approval for an automobile loan in the amount $87,078.50 to pay for the purchase of a new 2002 Mercedes Benz S500V sedan for Shamsud-Din Ali. In a telphone conversation during which Faridah Ali told a relative she was buying the Mercedes, Ali said that Shamsud-Din Ali "can't make a statement in a seven-year-old car....A world leader can't be driving around in an old car."

Tax Violations

With regard to the monies generated by the Shamsud-Din Ali and Faridah Ali through their illegal activities, the Indictment also charges both Shamsud-Din Ali and Faridah Ali with tax evasion during the period from 1998 through 2001, and charges Faridah Ali with filing false tax returns which failed to disclose her illegal income.

Perjury/False Statements

Finally, the Indictment charges John Christmas with perjury before the grand jury and with making false statements to the FBI regarding his involvement in the scheme in which KIFS' secured a contract with the COP to collect real estate taxes from Bowman Properties, Ltd. and RS and received a $60,595 commission for performing no work related to the contract.

The defendants in this case are charged as follows:

Shamsud-Din Ali is charged which RICO, RICO conspiracy, 9 counts of mail fraud and mail fraud conspiracy, 8 counts of wire fraud and wire fraud conspiracy, 11 counts of interstate travel and use of a facility in aid of racketeering, 1 count of bank fraud, 3 counts of extortion, extortion conspiracy and attempted extortion, and 4 counts of tax evasion. He faces a maximum sentence of 290 years imprisonment.

Faridah Ali is charged with RICO, RICO conspiracy, 5 counts of mail fraud and mail fraud conspiracy, 8 counts of wire fraud and wire fraud conspiracy, 4 counts of tax evasion and 3 counts of filing false tax returns. She faces a maximum sentence of 134 years imprisonment.

John Christmas is charged with 4 counts of mail fraud and mail fraud conspiracy, 2 counts of perjury and 1 count of making false statements to the FBI. He faces a maximum sentence of 35 years imprisonment.

Steven Vaughn is charged with 4 counts of mail fraud and mail fraud conspiracy. He faces a maximum sentence of 20 years imprisonment.

Richard Meehan is charged with 11 counts of interstate travel and use of a facility in aid of racketeering. He faces a maximum sentence of 55 years imprisonment.

John Johnson is charged with 3 counts of extortion, extortion conspiracy and attempted extortion. He faces a maximum sentence of 60 years imprisonment.

John Salter is charged with 1 count of bank fraud. He faces a maximum sentence of 30 years imprisonment.

INFORMATION REGARDING THE DEFENDANTS

United States Attorney's Office: Eastern District of Pennsylvania

Victim/Witness Information - Pennsylvania

Witnesses vouch for Shamsud-din Ali
A talk-radio host and a Shriners leader were among the backers. Two city officials are up next.
By George Anastasia, Inquirer Staff Writer

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Legendary radio talk-show host Mary Mason, public-relations guru R. Bruce Crawley, and the imperial potentate of the African American Shriners headed a parade of character witnesses who testified yesterday at the racketeering trial of Imam Shamsud-din Ali.

Mason, who hugged Ali after she completed her brief stint on the witness stand in U.S. District Court, said the imam had "an impeccable reputation in the community."

And while she said she was aware of the charges leveled against him from reading media accounts of the case, she quickly added: "I don't believe everything I read in the newspapers."

Crawley, chairman of the African-American Chamber of Commerce in Philadelphia, and the Rev. William F. Crockett, head of the 40,000-member Prince Hall Shriners, also sang the praises of the Muslim cleric. Both said he had an outstanding reputation, and both recounted Ali's role in ensuring that the Shriners held their annual convention in Philadelphia in 2003.

The convention, Crawley said, generated about $25 million for the city.

Mason and Crawley also vouched for the reputation of former Deputy Mayor John Christmas, a codefendant in the case.

Other character witnesses were called for Christmas and for the third defendant, businessman John Johnson, during yesterday's session.

The defense is expected to conclude its case today with testimony from top mayoral aide George Burrell and City Councilwoman Jannie Blackwell.

Both are to be questioned about city contracts that have been linked to the alleged racketeering enterprise that the government has charged Ali, 67, with heading.

The imam is accused of orchestrating a series of scams to generate illegal income for companies or institutions he controlled.

Christmas is charged with aiding in one of those schemes, in which Ali's company, Keystone Information & Financial Services, was paid a $60,595 commission by the city, allegedly for doing no work in the collection of a delinquent property tax.

Johnson is accused of conspiring with Ali to extort two waste-hauling companies that had or were trying to gain city contracts.

The trial, which began April 21, is expected to go to the jury next week after closing arguments from the prosecution and defense.

Ali's lawyer, James Binns, argued in his opening statement that the government was "overzealous" in its investigation and had failed to prove a racketeering enterprise existed.

He and the lawyers for Johnson and Christmas have also argued that the government misinterpreted legitimate business deals as criminal activity.

Contact staff writer George Anastasia at 856-779-3846 or ganastasia@phillynews.com.

Here are some excerpts from Steven Vaughn's Guilty Plea Agreement:

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE EASTERN DISTRICT OF PENNSYLVANIA
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: v.: CRIMINAL NO. 04-00611-04 STEVEN VAUGHN:

The defendant agrees to plead guilty to Counts Three and Four ... charging him with conspiracy to commit mail fraud and mail fraud,... arising from a scheme to defraud the City of Philadelphia and its citizens... conducted by the defendant and his coconspirators SHAMSUD-DIN ALI and JOHN CHRISTMAS... involving the award of a professional services contract... to Keystone Information & Financial Services, Inc., and the payment of a $60,595.61 fee... to KIFS, in connection with the payment of a real estate tax delinquency....

On or about April 24, 2001, the Bowman Properties bookkeeper gave VAUGHN three cashiers checks in the total amount of $204,000, and instructed VAUGHN to deliver the checks to the City of Philadelphia in payment of real estate taxes.... Rather, in furtherance of the scheme to defraud,... VAUGHN held the three cashiers checks until after KIFS had obtained the professional service contract with the Law Department, so that KIFS could claim entitlement to the payment of a commission in connection with the Bowman Properties tax payments....

On or about July 25, 2001, the Bowman Properties bookkeeper gave VAUGHN two additional checks totaling $242,221.38.... On September 28, 2001, the Bowman Properties bookkeeper gave VAUGHN sixteen checks totaling $71,706.25.... Again, VAUGHN failed to deliver the checks to the City of Philadelphia....

From July 2001 through October 5, 2001, SHAMSUD-DIN ALI and STEVEN VAUGHN had numerous telephone conversations during which ALI advised VAUGHN of the efforts of ALI and CHRISTMAS to obtain a contract for KIFS with the Law Department that would allow KIFS to claim a fee for collecting the Bowman Properties real estate taxes.

On or about October 5, 2001, SHAMSUD-DIN ALI delivered to the Law Department the same checks that the Bowman Properties bookkeeper had delivered to VAUGHN....

On or about March 26, 2002, the City of Philadelphia issued a check in the amount of $60,595.61 payable to KIFS... as co-counsel for the Bowman Properties real estate tax collection....

On April 18, 2002, defendant SHAMSUD-DIN ALI and STEVEN VAUGHN met at the KIFS business office at 7108 Germantown Avenue. During this meeting, which was recorded on audio and videotape, VAUGHN told ALI that he needed money to pay personal expenses. VAUGHN told ALI he "needed at least 54," meaning $5,400. ALI told VAUGHN he could get "two grand" for VAUGHN....

On or about April 18, 2002, defendant SHAMSUD-DIN ALI cashed a check drawn on the KIFS business checking account in the amount of $2,000 made payable to "Shamsud-din Ali."

At 2:09 p.m. on or about April 18, 2002, defendant SHAMSUD-DIN ALI left a voice-mail message for STEVEN VAUGHN, during which ALI told VAUGHN: "I can cover the first request you made. I already picked that up. But I'm looking for something else."

From approximately 3:25 p.m. until approximately 4:10 p.m. on or about April 18, 2002, defendant SHAMSUD-DIN ALI and STEVEN VAUGHN met at ALI's personal residence located at 36 Latham Parkway, Elkins Park. Investigative agents conducted surveillance of the meeting. An agent observed VAUGHN carrying cash in his hand when he left the meeting."

(Counsel has advised the government that the defendant does not agree with all of the facts stated by the government regarding the $2,000 payment from SHAMSUD-DIN ALI. Although the government believes it could establish these facts beyond a reasonable doubt at trial, these facts are not necessary to establish the essential elements of the offenses to which the defendant has agreed to plead guilty.)

Note that, while Steven Vaughn denies the government's account of his receiving $2000, he does not deny setting up the fraudulent contract to collect taxes he'd already been handed.

Dueling images of Phila.'s Imam Ali
He is regarded as a gentle, spiritual man. Federal agents say he is a thug.
By Nancy Phillips, George Anastasia and Maria Panaritis
Inquirer Staff Writers

Three years ago, Philadelphia's power elite couldn't say enough good things about the imam.

Mayor Street and District Attorney Lynne M. Abraham, Congressmen Robert A. Brady and Chaka Fattah - they all saluted the Islamic school that Imam Shamsud-din Ali ran with his wife. The district attorney took out a full-page ad in the program book for the school's anniversary.

But even as the powerful were posing for photos in the spring of 2001, the FBI was secretly launching an investigation into the Muslim cleric's alleged ties to a group of cocaine dealers in North Philadelphia.

That probe is expected to climax shortly with Ali's indictment in the second major case to emerge from the federal investigation of municipal corruption.

Authorities are expected to charge the high-profile mosque leader with cashing in on his connections to get no-work city contracts. It is unclear whether any indictment will involve drug charges.

As federal agents have closed in, and as some of his old friends have distanced themselves from him publicly, the imam seems serene.

"I know it isn't true. God knows it isn't true and all the people who know me know it isn't true," Ali said in an interview in his West Philadelphia mosque. "How do people wrong their souls to say all these terrible things about someone they don't even know?

"I'm not unhappy and I'm not tormented. Believe me, God doesn't allow me to be scared."

It is hard to reconcile Ali's public persona - the soft voice and gaze, the gentle manner, the spiritual talk - with the image held by law enforcement investigators. They call him an operator and a thug who fraternizes with drug dealers and mobsters.

Is his calm the serenity of a devout man? Or the steely resolve of someone hardened by time in prison, of a con artist whose mask never slips?

His supporters and those who attend Ali's mosque see him as a religious leader who transformed his life and the lives of those around him after serving 51/2 years in prison for the 1970 murder of a Baptist minister. That conviction was later overturned.

A founder of Philadelphia Masjid and the Sister Clara Muhammad School, Ali, 65, fashioned himself into a leading voice in the city's Muslim community.

He adeptly maneuvered city politics, while building a large and devoted congregation in West Philadelphia. He could deliver votes from an untapped constituency, politicians believed.

To the federal authorities on his trail, Ali, once known as Clarence Fowler, is a former member of the city's Black Mafia who has never cut his ties to the drug underworld.

In seeking permission to tap his phone, the FBI told a federal judge Ali was part of a network involved in "the distribution of illegal drugs... extortion and kidnapping schemes... money laundering... acts of violence... and a scheme involving bribery of a public official."

A defense lawyer has said, in a court filing, that information tying Ali to any of this was thin and that reels of wiretap tape captured little, if any, evidence that Ali was immersed in the drug world.

Still, his detractors say Ali's $250,000 home inside a gated Cheltenham community and the expensive cars he and his wife drive - two Mercedes-Benz sedans - belie the image of a humble servant of Allah.

Even the drug dealers who have told authorities they made payments to Ali through the school and his mosque could see the irony.

In a conversation recorded by the FBI and confirmed by a federal prosecutor, one reputed kingpin expressed his frustration: "He's walking with kings, and we're out here on the streets hustling."

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After hearing Ali talk with an alleged major drug dealer in the bugged conversations, the FBI won permission to tap the imam's home and cell phones. The conversations yielded something unexpected - discussions of allegedly corrupt dealings with City Hall.

The bugs triggered two municipal corruption investigations, an inquiry into fraud at the Community College of Philadelphia, and, ultimately, the placement of the FBI bug in the mayor's office.

The first major indictment in the inquiry came in June, when federal authorities indicted lawyer and Street ally Ronald A. White, the former city treasurer, and 10 others.

In addition to examining White's influence over the awarding of lucrative city contracts, investigators are focusing on business deals arranged for companies controlled by Ali. They include a $60,000 debt-collection contract with City Hall and a smaller telecommunications deal at Philadelphia International Airport.

Sources say that the FBI, during its investigation, also learned that Ali threatened two men, including a top Street aide whom Ali believed had been assisting the government. Through a lawyer, Ali has denied that.

White and Ali are friends, each self-made men who made successes of themselves out of humble beginnings.

While White grew up in the North, Ali spent his early childhood in the deep South. Born Clarence Fowler, he was the the third of six children of a nurse and a farmer.

His earliest years were in Oakfield, Ga., a rural outpost where the family raised cotton and corn on a sprawling farm. There, at a young age, he learned a harsh lesson about race.

In an interview earlier this year, Ali described his first encounter with segregated America.

At that time in Georgia, black people could not walk on the sidewalk while a white person was on it. "You were required to jump off," Ali recalled.

One day, Ali was walking with an elderly neighbor when two white men approached. When his neighbor didn't move swiftly to step off the sidewalk, one of the white men reached into a display barrel, grabbed a hammer, and struck the old man.

He crumbled to the ground, blood oozing from his head. The young Ali burst into tears.

"I didn't understand it," Ali said. "I didn't understand the blood. People walked by and they paid absolutely no attention."

In time, Ali's father, Maurice, arrived and took the man to the hospital.

A few years later, Maurice Fowler moved his family north, eventually settling on Randolph Street in South Philadelphia.

The city's racial mix made an impression on the 4-year-old Clarence. "The neighborhood was Italian and Irish and Polish," Ali recalled. "And over on the north side was the Jewish community."

But in his mid-20s, during a period of national unrest, Ali adopted a philosophy of racial separatism.

After attending a sermon by Jeremiah Shabbazz, a Philadelphia leader of the Nation of Islam, Ali abandoned the Christianity of his youth and embraced a form of black nationalism that rejected interaction with other races.

Ali recalled the discipline practiced by the group as a force for good.

"I saw people come in the Nation of Islam and abandon liquor and drugs, and straighten their entire life up and start taking care of their families," he said. "The Nation of Islam produced attitude and behavior that was extraordinary."

Ali became active in the group in the 1960s, quickly rising to a leadership position in the Fruit of Islam, an elite security patrol based out of Mosque No. 12 in North Philadelphia.

Yet some in that mosque were not so exemplary. By 1970, police had identified several members as part of a violent criminal organization that called itself the Black Mafia.

Members of this group were convicted of murdering seven people in a Washington house - execution-style killings blamed on philosophical and religious quarrels among African American Muslims. The Black Mafia also were suspected in two slayings in Cherry Hill and a gang-related shootout at Club Harlem in Atlantic City.

Federal and city intelligence documents listed Fowler as a Black Mafia member before the group finally dissolved in the late 1980s.

In 1972, Fowler was convicted of killing a Baptist minister from North Philadelphia and was sentenced to life in prison. That conviction was overturned, but not before he spent nearly six years behind bars.

He emerged from prison as Shamsud-din Ali - "light of the religion" - touting a new, less separtist offshoot of the Nation of Islam.

"Did he find redemption?" asked Chief Inspector Joseph O'Connor, a former head of the Police Department's organized crime unit. "Maybe. Who knows?... I just know who he was - a mover and shaker in the black underworld."

Before the FBI investigation surfaced, Ali was a mover and shaker in political circles. The associations that attracted the FBI's attention remained largely out of public view.

Ali is on the boards of the African American Chamber of Commerce and the Philadelphia Prison System - an appointment made by Street. Active in civic affairs, he has joined publicly with Jewish leaders to promote interfaith relations and denounce terror.

A voracious reader with an expansive vocabulary, Ali said in an interview that he has only a high school education.

In a resume Ali submitted to the city as he was seeking government contracts, he listed years of study at Imam Muhammad Ibn Saud Islamic University in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia; the University of Medina in Saudi Arabia; and the Institute of Islamic and Arabic Sciences in America, in Fairfax, Va.

Ronald Donatucci, the city's register of wills and a longtime friend, described Ali as a deeply religious man with whom he had conversations about the Bible and the Koran. "Every elected official I knew was always in his company," Donatucci said. "There were police captains in full uniform at his events. Never one person ever came to me and said, 'Stay away.' "

Councilwoman Jannie L. Blackwell, among those Ali has supported over the years, described him as "a very, very kind, loving person."

When you're with the imam, she said, "you feel a calmness. You feel that you're around a man who is at peace."

Before Blackwell took office, the imam supported her late husband, Lucien Blackwell. He served on City Council, ran for mayor, and was later elected to Congress.

Ali had become a fixture in Blackwell's council district after his release from prison in 1976. He established a mosque and Islamic school on the grounds of the former St. Thomas More Catholic High School at 47th and Wyalusing Streets and swiftly developed a large following.

In the fall of 1982, Gov. Richard Thornburgh visited Ali's mosque during his reelection campaign. Shoeless and in a gray pinstripe suit, the Republican joined Ali and other Muslims as they knelt in prayer.

The following year, Ali and the Blackwells traveled to Cape Canaveral, Fla., to see Philadelphia-born astronaut Guion S. Bluford Jr. take off in the space shuttle Challenger. Also there were U.S. Rep. William H. Gray 3d, schools superintendent Constance Clayton, and Kenny Gamble of Philadelphia International Records.

Years later, on a far more somber occasion, Ali welcomed then-Mayor Rendell to his mosque to eulogize Ali's 26-year-old son. The young man, Abdul-Rafi Ali, and two others were fatally shot in a single weekend of violence in the summer of 1996.

Ali supported Rendell's campaigns in both city- and statewide races. On Election Day in 2002, the Rendell campaign paid Ali's school $16,200 for help in getting voters to the polls.

At that point, the FBI was wrapping up its 18-month wiretapping of the imam.

"If I say someone's a good person, they'll accept my word for it," Ali said. "Rendell is one of the ones that's been favored. Certainly John Street has been favored... . I once said Ronald Reagan was a good person and they voted for him. They accepted my word."

Politicians, in turn, supported the Sister Clara school, turning out for its annual fund-raisers, typically black-tie affairs, complete with dinner and a concert.

In 1995, Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes headlined. The program featured pictures of the Ali family with Mike Tyson and Muhammad Ali, a friend of the imam's from his Nation of Islam days.

Also among the school's benefactors that year: Philadelphia crime boss Joseph "Skinny Joey" Merlino, who saluted the school in an ad on behalf of his restaurant, Avenue Cafe.

Mob informant Roger Vella has told federal authorities he was present during several meetings between Merlino and Ali in the 1990s, according to people familiar with Vella's account. Merlino has denied it.

At the time, Merlino was interested in expanding into the drug underworld, Vella said, and believed Ali could offer him protection in prison.

Federal authorities also observed a meeting Ali had with reputed Scranton mob boss William "Big Billy" D'Elia in 2001.

Ali has scoffed at the notion that he is somehow tied to the mob and has denied any business relationship with D'Elia.

"There's no African American mobsters," he said with a smile.

Criminal investigators, however, portray Ali as a shadowy Godfather-type figure whose underworld currency is the influence he developed years ago among Muslim inmates while serving time.

Ali acknowledged this influence, but said he was a positive influence, brokering peace during a time of violence in prisons in the 1970s.

Now a member of the city's prison board, Ali remains a presence among inmates and administrators alike, said his lawyer, James J. Binns.

"He is more revered in Graterford than he is on the streets or in the masjid where he preaches - and not just by the prisoners," said Binns, who has visited the prison with Ali.

When the imam walked into the state penitentiary, Binns said, "it was as though George Bush was going to visit the troops in Baghdad."

Several informants have told the FBI that drug dealers made cash payments to Ali's mosque in exchange for protection in prison. Ali has denied that.

The drug dealers and ex-convicts who have worshipped at his mosque go there, he said, for spiritual counseling.

"I have met people who are criminally inclined," he said. "I've been to prison with people who are criminally inclined. I would believe, pleasing to God, I have turned more people's minds around than anybody we know."

Today, Ali's appeal among worshippers is declining.

Philadelphia Masjid has lost members who have become disgruntled with his leadership.

The Sister Clara school, once a beacon in the Islamic community, has for some years been beset with financial troubles and dwindling enrollment - problems that have grown worse since the FBI's focus on Ali and his wife became public.

The school sometimes goes without heat on cold winter days. Teachers have gone unpaid at times. Enrollment at the K-12 school has dropped to 20. At its peak, the school boasted 600 students.

Ali's choice of a second wife was a reason for some earlier defections from the mosque and the school.

In 1990, Ali secretly married Rita Spicer, a tall, striking woman who quickly became a polarizing force. Ali was still married to his first wife, Lillian, at the time. He did not divorce her until 1995 - White handled the divorce proceedings.

Some detractors likened Spicer to a Vegas showgirl, saying she had "bewitched" the imam.

A public relations specialist and boxing events promoter, Spicer had dated Earl "Mustafa" Stewart, who was the chief cocaine supplier for the Junior Black Mafia, a new group of dealers who sought to emulate the previous ring.

Before he was jailed on federal drug charges, Stewart squired Spicer around in limousines and sat ringside with her at boxing matches. At the time, Stewart later admitted, he was trafficking hundreds of kilograms of narcotics into Philadelphia.

Spicer, now known as Faridah Ali, said she broke off the relationship in 1990 shortly before Stewart's arrest. She said she did not know that he dealt drugs, an assertion at odds with later reports that she secretly cooperated with federal authorities who ultimately dismantled the Junior Black Mafia.

Ali and Spicer wed privately in the summer of 1990, though their union soon made its way into the pages of the Philadelphia Tribune. The Alis held a public celebration in October 1990. Then-City Councilman Lucien Blackwell was in the wedding party, Faridah Ali recalled.

After the wedding, Spicer took a Muslim name and donned a khimar, the traditional women's head covering. She said Ali gave her the name Faridah, which means "precious gem."

Faridah Ali, who directs the Muslim school, is called by the staff as "Dr. Ali," although she holds no bachelor's degree and earned her master's and doctorate degrees from a school that offers "life experience" degrees on the Internet.

In May, Faridah Ali and her two grown children were charged with fraud in a scheme, officials said, involving taxpayer-paid adult-education classes at the Sister Clara school. The case grew out of the FBI's wiretaps.

According to the indictment, she and the others padded the books with phony teachers and students for nonexistent classes - held at same school saluted by all those politicians.

While well-known and well-regarded in political circles and the Muslim community, Ali did not become widely known to the public until Oct. 8, 2003.

On that day, the FBI raided his Mount Airy office and Cheltenham home, searching for evidence related to the tax-collection and airport deals, among others. The raid came one day after the bug was found in City Hall.

According to the imam, federal prosecutors are bent on portraying him as "the worst guy in town." He says that he has been through this before - been accused of charges that don't stand up.

"What they can do to an African American is unbelievable," he said. "America has a problem that surely will get the attention of God."

He says he is under attack because he is Muslim.

"A person like myself might say they hate Islam - and they probably do - but they are ignorant to Islam," Ali said of federal investigators.

"What the government doesn't know is Satan rules it," he said in sermon-like fashion.

Ali said the FBI's bias was evident the day of the raid.

"They came at me like I was roaming down the street with a tank or something," Ali said. "I said, 'Just ring my bell, c'mon in, please.'"

Ali answered the door that day as the imam.

Federal authorities had come for someone else.

Contact staff writer Nancy Phillips at 215-854-2254 or nphillips@phillynews.com. Staff writers Angela Couloumbis and Mark Fazlollah contributed to this article.