New Mexico Muslim Family Claims Dead 3-Y-O Boy Will 'Return as Jesus' and Identify Evil Groups
A Muslim family from New Mexico believes that their dead 3-year-old boy is set to return as Jesus Christ and identify evil targets to be abolished.
Prosecutors said Monday in court that the boy died in a demonic exorcism. The family, which had their bail set for $20,000 each, is accused of training children to use weapons and preaching about martyrdom, CNN reported.
Eleven other children were taken away from the family, described by authorities as being in a starving and ragged state when they were found and placed in custody on Aug. 3.
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An FBI agent said that the family believed that the ritual would free the boy from the demons, which would allow him to return four months later.
The family further believed that the boy would then reveal which institutions must be eradicated. And those who did not believe their message would have to be killed or detained "until they believed," a teenager on the compound said, as reported by CNN.
Reuters reported that the five adult members of the family, two men and three women, are all related by marriage or are siblings. Three of them are the children of a prominent New York City Muslim cleric.
Defense lawyer Thomas Clark told reporters that despite his clients' controversial beliefs, they have been targeted for prosecution because of their Muslim faith and for being African-American.
"If these people were white and Christian, nobody would bat an eye over the idea of faith healing, or praying over a body or touching a body and quoting scripture," Clark argued.
"But when black Muslims do it, there seems to be something nefarious, something evil," he added.
The main suspect, 39-year-old Siraj Ibn Wahhaj, has been charged with abducting his severely ill 3-year-old son from the home of the boy's mother in December.
The boy's body was found at the compound in New Mexico where the family lived, three days after investigators carried out a raid.
Although the family is to remain under house arrest for now, they are still facing 11 counts of felony child abuse.
Judge Sarah Backus said on Monday:
"What I've heard here today is troubling, definitely. Troubling facts about numerous children in far from ideal circumstances and individuals who are living in a very unconventional way— although if you have lived in northern New Mexico for any period of time you are aware that many people here live in unconventional ways."
Backus said that although the information coming out of the family suggests there was a "big plan afoot," he has not been presented clear and convincing evidence to explain what the plan was.
"The state wants me to make a leap, and it's a large leap. And that would be to hold people in jail without bond based on — again — troubling facts. But I didn't hear any choate plan that was being alleged by the state," he said.
