Just a Phone Call Away

Just a phone call away

U.S. officials pay out millions to tipsters for help finding terrorists

By Kevin Whitelaw

Edgar Gustavo Navarro had been a wanted man for months when the crucial tip about his whereabouts came into the U.S. Embassy in Colombia. The informant had learned from an episode of the U.S. television show 60 Minutes II about a U.S. reward offer for Navarro, a commander in the Colombian terrorist group Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) blamed for the kidnapping of three American contractors. After contacting U.S. diplomats and describing the location of Navarro's hideout, the source and two other colleagues guided the Colombian Army through the jungle for several days to the guerrilla camp. At 4 p.m. on Oct. 19, 2003, soldiers raided the camp, killing 11 bodyguards and Navarro in a brutal gun battle.

For their efforts, the informants, whose identities are kept secret, each received a $300,000 reward. The payoff was part of the Rewards for Justice program, run by the State Department's Bureau of Diplomatic Security, which offers up to $25 million for tips that lead to the capture--or death--of some of the nation's most wanted terrorists. While the program has been around for two decades, it is a growing part of the U.S. counterterrorism apparatus and has been expanded to include "high value" Iraqi targets, such as Baathist official Muhammad Zimam al-Razzaq al-Sadun. A tipster who provided his whereabouts was paid $1 million. Indeed, the State Department has paid out nearly $48 million to 19 different people since Sept. 11, 2001. Although its success with al Qaeda targets has been limited, the reward offers have helped net some key fugitives, particularly in Iraq. U.S. officials say that five of Saddam Hussein's henchmen were nabbed with the help of tipsters motivated by t! he promise of cash.

The highest-profile case, involving the feared sons of Saddam, is a dramatic reminder of just how powerful a motive greed can be. Only 18 days after $15 million rewards were offered for Uday and Qusay Hussein, a tipster contacted U.S. soldiers from the 101st Airborne Division with the location of their hideout. Within 24 hours, the brothers were killed in a lengthy firefight with U.S. troops. Rumors later spread in Iraq that Uday and Qusay were betrayed by a close cousin who disappeared from Iraq around the time of the raid. U.S. officials refuse to comment on the tipster's identity but confirm that the informant was paid a record $30 million--and is no longer in Iraq.

Al Qaeda--and Osama bin Laden in particular--have been a more difficult target for the rewards program. The al Qaeda leader has had a price on his head for years. The reward was raised to $25 million after 9/11, but U.S. officials have yet to find someone in bin Laden's devout circle willing and able to betray him. "Where he is, we believe he is hiding among friends," says Francis Taylor, the assistant secretary of state for diplomatic security. "$25 million doesn't lead them to break with their tradition of helping friends." Bin Laden's most important deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri, also remains at large, despite a $25 million reward offer, as does America's most wanted man in Iraq, Abu Musab Zarqawi, also an al Qaeda associate.

Still, reward offers can snare some al Qaeda targets. The most recent payoff--$1 million--went four months ago to three informants who led Philippine authorities to Hamsiraji Marusi Sali, the No. 3 man in Abu Sayyaf, a key al Qaeda affiliate. Sali, who was wanted for kidnapping three Americans and was accused of involvement in the deaths of two of them, was killed in a shootout with Philippine soldiers. Another well-publicized success was the capture of Ramzi Yousef, one of the 1993 World Trade Center bombers, who was fingered in 1995 by an informant looking for the reward money.

Risk and reward. Today, the State Department is offering rewards for nearly 50 fugitives, including a dozen targets in Iraq. To receive money, an informant must help find someone who was involved in a terrorist act or is currently plotting one. But U.S. officials insist that they cannot guarantee any money in advance. "We don't promise anyone anything other than an assessment of the information and its value," says Taylor. An interagency committee including the FBI and others makes the final decision on whether--and how much--to pay, based in part on how risky it was for the informant to come forward.

U.S. officials are trying to raise the program's profile and, in particular, convince potential tipsters that the rewards are genuine. That is proving to be difficult, in part because the informants never attest publicly to their payoff because of their guaranteed anonymity. State Department officials say most of the 43 people who have received rewards in the program's history have been sent the money electronically once they have resettled, usually outside their home countries. But there have also been a few cases where diplomatic security agents had to fly abroad to deliver suitcases of cash in person to informants. U.S. officials have also helped informants in some cases to relocate if their lives are threatened. "We work to make sure they can enjoy the benefits of their rewards," says Taylor. A few of the tipsters have ended up in the United States, but most choose to remain abroad--in part because those who come to America must pay taxes as high as 60 percent on the rew! ard money. "If they go to the Riviera, they don't get taxed at all," notes one State Department official.

Marketing the program in remote places like Afghanistan, where bin Laden is believed to be hiding, has been particularly challenging. The State Department has been tweaking its radio and print advertisements about the rewards to emphasize the Muslim lives lost in most of al Qaeda's attacks. Still, the most effective way of spreading the word in a part of the world where just about everybody smokes has been distributing matchbooks with photos of bin Laden and other fugitives.

But officials concede that sheepherders in Afghanistan often don't understand the value of $25 million, and they are looking into offering other forms of compensation. For his part, bin Laden, citing authority from the Koran, promises his followers who die in attacks on westerners a stable of virgins. Counters one official, "We can't come up with 70 virgins, but we can come up with goats."

State's diplomatic security agents find that they have to sift through a bizarre range of tips, many of them frivolous. Several people, for instance, have called to report that bin Laden is somewhere on the Afghanistan-Pakistan border--and then demanded payment. "It ranges from the sublime to the ridiculous," says Taylor, "but we follow every lead that comes in." Some informants may themselves operate on the criminal fringe. But that's not a disqualification; nor do officials rule out paying mercenaries. "I don't want to give the impression that we will pay bounty hunters to kill them," says Taylor, "but we will pay ! for information."

In fact, informants have even earned rewards for helping capture terrorists who never made the most-wanted list. Three days after the 1998 bombing of the U.S. Embassy in Nairobi, the makeshift U.S. command post logged a telephone call from an anonymous source reporting a stranger who was wounded in the bombing but could not communicate with the locals and was acting suspiciously. After calling back several times, the source agreed to monitor the man's movements (a risky plan) and eventually pointed him out to investigators. Mohamed al-Owali, who turned out to be one of the bombers, was arrested and is now serving a life sentence in a U.S. prison. For his help, the informant eventually received a $3.5 million reward.