Death of Somali teen is mystery

Death of Somali teen is mystery
The Associated Press • June 10, 2009

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MINNEAPOLIS ) — He was an infant when he left his homeland of Somalia. He grew up an American, a bright student with dreams of becoming a doctor or lawyer. But those dreams ended when 18-year-old Burhan Hassan returned to Somalia months ago and eventually was killed under mysterious circumstances.



Hassan was one of about a dozen young Somali men who have gone missing from the Minneapolis area over the last couple years — recruited, their families say, by radical elements in Somalia. Relatives said they learned Friday that he had been killed and buried in Mogadishu, the Somali capital, but they had few details.

His death follows a suicide bombing carried out in that warring Horn of Africa country by a young Somali man from Minneapolis last October.

“We believe he was killed because he would have been a key person in the investigation into the recruitment (of young Somali men) here in Minneapolis,” said Hassan’s uncle, Abdirizak Bihi. Bihi said his nephew was found dead — shot in the head — in an open area of the city.

Hassan’s mother declined to comment Monday. But Bihi, her brother, said she’s “devastated, the whole family’s devastated.”

“We had a young kid, we put all the efforts in our life to bring him here,” Bihi said.

FBI Special Agent E.K. Wilson said he could not confirm whether Hassan had been killed. A State Department spokeswoman, Joanne Moore, had no firm information either.

The FBI has acknowledged an ongoing investigation into the disappearances, but won’t elaborate. Several local Somalis say they’ve been questioned by the FBI, Customs officials, or subpoenaed to appear before a federal grand jury over the last several months.

Hassan — who was raised by a single mother after his father died in an accident — was 8 months old when his family arrived at a refugee camp in Kenya. With two older brothers and a sister, he was not yet 4 when they came to the U.S. in 1996.

Hassan was a student at Roosevelt High School and taking college courses through the University of Minnesota, with dreams of attending Harvard University to study medicine or law.

“He never knew anything about Somalia. He grew up here. He was an American kid,” Bihi said. He said his nephew did not even speak the Somali language.

Like some of the other missing young people, Hassan had also attended the Abubakar As-Saddique Islamic Center in Minneapolis. Has san had gone to the mosque for more than 10 years and was involved in a youth group there, another uncle told a U.S. Senate committee in March.

Officials of the mosque — the largest in Minnesota — have repeatedly denied accusations by families of some of the missing men that the mosque played a role in their decision to leave.