:: Deepquest ::

Rumors, snapshots, and speculations have been circulating on airplane geek sites and political message boards for some time now about “N379P.” This and other registration numbers are believed to belong to a plane used by the CIA to transport detainees to interrogation sites — in foreign countries known to subject prisoners to torture. A story in the Chicago Tribune has more, and begins with an attempt to track down the name under which the craft is registered. None of the known registration numbers are listed in the FAA database.

ike Leonard T. Bayard, the only named principal in Keeler and Tate, one Tyler Edward Tate, also appears not to exist in any public records accessible by the Tribune. Premier Executive’s only listed executive is its president, Bryan P. Dyess. A person with that name does appear in commercial databases, but his only addresses are two post office boxes in Arlington, Va., not far from CIA headquarters. Premier Executive purchased or leased the new Gulfstream V in 1999, FAA records show. The plane’s original registration number, N581GA, would later be changed by the FAA to N379P, and again to 8068V.

The first public mention of the Gulfstream appeared six weeks after Sept. 11, 2001, when a Pakistani newspaper reported that Jamil Qasim Saeed Mohammed, a 27-year-old microbiology student at Karachi University, had been spirited aboard the plane at Karachi’s airport by Pakistani security officers in the early hours of Oct. 23, 2001.

There is no information about where Mohammed was taken. But Pakistani officials said later that Mohammed, a Yemeni national, was believed by the U.S. to belong to Al Qaeda and to have information about the October 2000 bombing of the USS Cole.

Since Sept. 11, unnamed U.S. officials have been quoted in several publications discussing the U.S. practice of “rendition,” which involves sending suspected terrorists or Al Qaeda supporters captured abroad for interrogation to countries where human rights are not traditionally respected.
related links [url=http://www.columbiatribune.com/2005/Jan/20050109News034.asp] Columbia Tribune[/url], [url=http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2004/12/09/jet_linked_to_torture_claims_is_sold/]Boston Globe[/url], [url=][/url]