All three South Florida men charged with providing financial support to the Pakistani Taliban will remain in custody until trial after a judge denied bail this week for the youngest, according to the Associated Press.
24-year-old Izhar Khan, a Margate imam, his brother Irfam Khan, 37, and father Hafiz Khan, 76, are accused of wiring or depositing nearly $50,000 into a bank account accessed by alleged co-conspirators in Pakistan.
Irfam Khan and Hafiz Khan were previously denied bail, but a judge waited to consider additional evidence before determining that the case against Izhar Khan was compelling enough to warrant detention.
"There's no confusion about these charges," Assistant U.S. Attorney John Shipley had argued. "The evidence against Hafiz Khan is overwhelming, and it was the assistance of people like Izhar that enabled him to send money over there."
Prosecutors allege that over the course of multiple phone calls, Hafiz Khan called for attacks on the Pakistani Assembly, asked his sons to collect donated money approved for the Taliban, discussed ways to shoot Pakistani officials, called for some officials to be killed in bombings, inquired as to whether the Taliban had received his funds, and discussed how to disguise payments meant for the purchase of firearms.
Hafiz Khan, who was imam at Miami's oldest mosque until his arrest, is also alleged to run a school in Pakistan that trains children as militants and shelters Taliban members.
The men face 15 years in prison on each of four charges if convicted.
