Federal Lawsuit Exposes Massive CAIR Fraud and Cover-up

Washington, D.C. (November 26, 2012) – Last Friday, the Law Offices of David Yerushalmi, P.C. and the American Freedom Law Center (AFLC) filed a devastating legal brief supported by hundreds of pages of evidence, asking a federal judge to find the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) liable to five of its former clients for fraud, breach of fiduciary duty, and intentional infliction of emotional distress.  The legal brief demonstrates beyond any reasonable doubt that CAIR is a criminal organization that deceptively holds itself out to the public as the nation’s largest Muslim-American civil rights organization.

The brief and supporting evidence were filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia in two companion cases, Saiyed v. CAIR and Lopez v. CAIR, in which David Yerushalmi is lead counsel.  The brief and supporting evidence overwhelmingly demonstrate that CAIR was involved in a massive criminal fraud and cover-up that injured numerous client-victims who had looked to CAIR for legal assistance, yet the CAIR “attorney” allegedly handling their cases was in fact not an attorney.

Yerushalmi, who is also Co-Founder and Senior Counsel of AFLC, commented, “The evidence has long suggested that CAIR is an organization set up by the Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas to further its aims of stealth Jihad in the United States,” referring to the fact that CAIR was named by the federal government as an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation terrorism financing trial.  “According to the facts that are carefully laid out in our legal brief and fully supported by the record evidence,” Yerushalmi explained, “CAIR has engaged in a massive criminal fraud in which numerous CAIR clients have been victimized, and because of the CAIR cover-up many still don’t realize it.  The fact that CAIR has victimized Muslims and non-Muslims alike demonstrates that it is only looking out for itself and its ongoing efforts to bilk donors out of millions of dollars of charitable donations thinking they are supporting a legitimate organization.”

Five former clients of CAIR filed the two lawsuits in federal court alleging common law and statutory fraud, breach of fiduciary duty, and intentional infliction of emotional distress against CAIR.  These two lawsuits followed an earlier lawsuit which had also alleged that CAIR’s fraudulent conduct amounted to racketeering, a federal RICO crime.  In that case, the court dismissed the RICO counts, concluding that CAIR’s conduct as alleged was fraudulent but not a technical violation of RICO.  The two civil lawsuits were filed by Yerushalmi on January 6, 2010, and because they arise out of the same facts, the cases were consolidated.

The supporting evidence, which was compiled after more than a year and a half of contentious discovery that involved numerous document requests, motions to compel the production of documents that CAIR was concealing, and multiple depositions of high-ranking CAIR officials, shows that Morris Days, the “Resident Attorney” and “Civil Rights Manager” at the now defunct CAIR-MD/VA chapter in Herndon, Virginia, was in fact not an attorney and that he failed to provide legal services for clients who came to CAIR for legal representation.  The evidence also shows that CAIR knew of this fraud and purposefully conspired with Days to keep the CAIR clients from discovering that their legal matters were being mishandled or not handled at all.  While Yerushalmi and AFLC represent the five plaintiffs in these two lawsuits, three of whom are Muslim Americans, according to CAIR’s internal documents, there were many more victims of the CAIR fraud scheme.

As set forth in the court filings, CAIR knew or should have known that Days was not a lawyer when it hired him.  But, like many organizations accused of wrongdoing, things got worse when CAIR officials were confronted with clear evidence of Days’ fraudulent conduct.  Rather than come clean and attempt to rectify past wrongs, CAIR conspired with Days to conceal and further the fraud.  To this end, CAIR officials purposefully concealed the truth about Days from the clients, law enforcement, and the media.  When CAIR did receive calls from irate clients about Days’ failure to provide competent legal services, CAIR fraudulently deceived them about Days’ relationship with CAIR, suggesting that he was never actually employed by CAIR.

Robert Muise, co-counsel in the lawsuit and Co-Founder and Senior Counsel of AFLC, commented: “The overwhelming evidence marshaled in this case will finally put to rest the myth fabricated by CAIR’s PR machine and perpetrated by a complicit media that this is a legitimate Muslim-American civil rights organization.  This lawsuit strips away CAIR’s veil of legitimacy.”

American Freedom Law Center Resources:

Press Release

Memo (Brief) (PDF)

Facts (Brief) (PDF)