Biography
Mohamed Albanna, an American citizen from Yemen, was arrested in 2006 for illegally sending large amounts of money out of the country through an unlicensed company. Authorities alleged that the money was used to support terrorists, but they have no way of knowing. For this, he was given the maximum sentence of 5 years in prison. Albanna was a leader in the Yemeni-American community in Lackawanna, NY, and many have argued that his conviction was motivated by racism.
Albanna also ran and won a seat on the city council of Lackawanna in 2017. However, a court determined him ineligible to hold office because he committed a crime of “moral turpitude” over a decade earlier.
