Egyptian returns home after two months in jail

ST. LOUIS -- An Egyptian man detained in jail for more than two months left Missouri for his homeland accompanied by two federal agents Tuesday.

Osama El Far, 30, had worked as a mechanic at Lambert Airport in St. Louis before he was detained Sept. 24.

That's when federal officials questioned him at the end of his overnight shift regarding the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Since then, El Far had been held in the Mississippi County Jail in Charleston, Mo., for the federal Immigration and Naturalization Service.

"It got to the point that I was about to despair to get out," said El Far. He had lived in the St. Louis suburb of University City while working as an airplane mechanic for Trans States Airline.

"I had a very bad experience with the authority, but I still love America and admire the American people," he told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

Authorities questioned El Far to see if he had any connection to the Sept. 11 suicide hijackings that killed about 4,000 people in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania.

He has repeatedly said he was not involved with the attacks.

According to court documents, El Far's denials passed an FBI polygraph test.

He said he did violate immigration laws by staying after his 1996 student visa expired and finding a job.

He was one of hundreds of Middle Eastern men detained across the country.

He started a hunger strike Nov. 23 to protest his detainment because a judge had granted his request to leave the country voluntarily, and yet he was not given a departure date. That hunger strike ended last week when he learned he would be allowed to return to Egypt.

On Tuesday, without a chance to pack his things, he was escorted by Immigration and Naturalization Service agents on a flight to New York's John F. Kennedy Airport. They were to remain with him until he left the country Tuesday for Cairo on an EgyptAir flight.