Witness Retracts Bomb Threat Testimony

A witness Tuesday in the trial of a Turkish man and his American girlfriend charged with planning to bomb a U.S. military base in Germany around last year’s Sept. 11 anniversary retracted statements that the woman had mentioned specific targets. The testimony prompted defense accusations that the witness had invented her story, and the court later freed defendant Astrid Eyzaguirre, 23, from custody, saying she was not a flight risk. Her friend Osman Petmezci, 25, remained jailed, charged with planning to attack the U.S. Army’s Criminal Investigation Department or a store on the base in this southwestern city, home to 16,000 U.S. troops and dependents stationed mainly with the Army’s European headquarters and the V Corps’ headquarters. Witness Christi Allen, 21, a U.S. national who used to work with Eyzaguirre at the base store, testified that she alerted the FBI in an e-mail after Eyzaguirre told her Petmezci “wanted to build a bomb” and she saw chemicals in their apartment. But under questioning by Judge Edgar Gramlich, she revised her earlier account to police that Eyzaguirre mentioned the two targets at the base. “She never said Osman was building a bomb for a particular purpose,” Allen told the Heidelberg state court. “I never knew, I could only assume.” Full Story