Trial begins for man accused of being ex-Hezbollah operative

A San Antonio man went on trial Monday on charges that he kept secret his prior affiliation with Hezbollah to remain in the United States and to possibly gain access to sensitive information.

Lebanese-born Wissam “Sam” Allouche, 45, denies the allegations that stem from relatives of his ex-wife reporting him to the FBI. When a Joint Terrorism Task Force opened an investigation of him in 2009, that automatically put him on a terror watch list.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Mark Roomberg told jurors in opening statements that Allouche admitted to an undercover agent to previously being a commander of the Amal militia and that he supported Hezbollah.

Roomberg also said there were a number of stories he told his ex-wife’s family — from being a prisoner of war in Israel to pummeling to death an Israeli pilot — that prompted counterterrorism agents to put together a ruse operation to verify the reports.

Army intelligence officer James Moss testified that the ruse involved Allouche being sought for an undercover assignment as a disgruntled Hezbollah operative to infiltrate Israel. The goal, Moss said, was to get Allouche to “open up to me.”

“My biggest concern was, if he was given top security clearance, that he’d be passing off sensitive information to extremist groups or to the government of Iran,” Moss testified.

Allouche was a contract linguist for the U.S. Army in Iraq a few years after he wed an Army officer in Germany and moved to the United States in 2002.

He was arrested in May 2013 by the FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force after being indicted on charges of not disclosing, during his quest to obtain his U.S. citizenship, his membership in the Amal militia and Hezbollah in Lebanon in the 1980s.

He’s also charged with not disclosing his prior membership in those groups when he applied for a linguist job with Defense Department that required a higher security clearance.

Counterterrorism officials alleged Allouche also falsely claimed to be a U.S. special operations forces officer during visits to Joint Base San Antonio-Fort Sam Houston and even tried to hook up with women at the post, possibly to gain access to sensitive information.

But his lead lawyer, Cynthia Orr, argued that the government’s allegations do not jibe with historical events. The Israeli pilot, she said, was killed in 1985, when Allouche lived in Germany. And, for Allouche to be a POW, he would have been 14 and an Amal commander at 16, Orr said.

“One of the reasons we are here is ... he likes to embellish his stories because he likes to look important,” Orr told jurors.

She also argued the FBI took advantage of Allouche’s divorce with the Army officer. He was in financial straits and desperate for work, she said. Because Allouche was on the watch list, it was difficult for him to find another job, while his ex-wife demanded child support, Orr said.

Orr also said the recordings of his meetings with Moss show Moss “cutting him off and leading the conversation to where agent Moss wants it to go.”

Orr argued that Allouche, to please Moss and land the “job,” sometimes just parroted what Moss said. Orr also noted Moss told Allouche that he needed to “have some sleaze ... or even worse, to be the kind of guy who did something so bad it got him kicked out of a country.”

Testimony continues this week before Senior U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth. Allouche faces up to 10 years in prison if convicted.

gcontreras@express-news.net