‘Terrorist’ Tape Termed Hoax; Tipster in Jail

The videotape obtained by the FBI was chilling: A man calling himself an Islamic terrorist armed with a shoe bomb, gas canisters and a gun claimed he and four others were planning a Sept. 11 attack on Disneyland against “our enemies.”

Authorities acted swiftly. Dozens of law officers, including FBI counterterrorism agents, raided the man’s Santa Ana mobile home Thursday. More than 100 stunned neighbors were evacuated. The suspect was arrested.

But no weapons or explosives were found.

On Friday, Liyanase Tony Fernando was released from jail, and the informant who provided the tape to officials was behind bars for allegedly setting up authorities for an elaborate hoax.

Federal officials say Jose Roberto Dominguez II, 22, of Anaheim staged the videotaping in a Santa Ana hotel room.

They say that he fashioned an “explosive vest” by spray-painting cans black, gluing lamp cords to them and putting them on the garment.

He also allegedly put flammable powder inside the drilled-out sole of a shoe. The gun was plastic.

Dominguez told authorities he believed that Fernando, whom he said he recently met at a Garden Grove Islamic center and knew as “Imran,” was capable of carrying out a suicide bombing.

“But Dominguez was overzealous in his efforts to show this,” according to the federal complaint against him, alleging that he made a false report.

Dominguez’s attorney said in court Friday that her client was a freelance journalist who stumbled upon what he thought was a story. Dominguez was ordered held without bail.

The “terrorist” featured in the videotape, authorities say, was in fact Fernando. As to why he dressed up for Dominguez’s camera and made the statements, “I have no clue,” said Assistant U.S. Atty. Kevin Smith.

Reached Friday afternoon at home, Fernando declined to comment on the case.

Federal officials “told me not to speak to anyone or say anything,” Fernando said, adding that he “didn’t know anything” about the videotape.

According to court documents, Dominguez on Wednesday gave the videotape to a Los Angeles County sheriff’s sergeant, who turned it over to the FBI.

On the tape, Fernando is seen on a couch in a hotel room, waving what appears to be a .45-caliber handgun and wearing the canister-laden vest, which he says contains C-4 explosives and gas.

He is being interviewed by someone off camera, who asks what his target is. Disneyland on Sept. 11, Fernando says. Four other “Muslim brothers” armed with machine guns will be with him, he says.

He holds up a running shoe, which he says contains C-4. Dominguez enters the scene, removes adhesive backing from the shoe and shakes out some dark powder.

Dominguez then puts a lighter to the powder, and it erupts in a flash.

Dominguez told FBI agents that he met Fernando six weeks earlier, according to court documents.

He said Fernando told him he was affiliated with the Abu Nidal terrorist organization and professed a hatred of Americans, calling them “white devils.”

After reviewing the tape, authorities got search warrants for Fernando’s vehicle and home in the Stoneridge Mobile Home Park.

When nothing was found, agents interviewed Dominguez again.

He allegedly confessed to concocting the tape and the story behind it, including the Sept. 11 date and Disneyland as the target, and he apologized, according to court documents.

In the mobile home park Friday, neighbors said they were shocked when Fernando was arrested by the FBI.

“Our reaction was, ‘You got to be kidding. That guy?’ He’s a nice guy; always plays with his kids,” said Duncan McNeill, 67.

McNeill said he didn’t mind the evacuation, that it was better to err on the side of caution, if it was only a hoax.