ISF Officer Tells STL He Received Orders to Rush to Crime Scene, Says 6 Cars Removed on Night after Blast
An Internal Security Forces officer, Tanios Gemayel, briefed the Special Tribunal for Lebanon on Monday on several missions that he undertook the day ex-Premier Rafik Hariri was assassinated on Feb. 14, 2005.
First Adjutant Gemayel, who works with judicial police in the scientific division and is a member of the Central Incident Bureau, appeared as a witness from Beirut via video link.
Gemayel said he was ordered to head to the Hariri crime scene to oversee the lifting of cars and their transport to the Helou barracks.
He told the court that he took video footage of four cars being taken and then in the second stage another two cars being lifted and transported on huge trucks to the barracks.
The process, which started around 11:00 pm lasted until 2:00 am, he said.
Gemayel did not confirm whether the cars belonged to Hariri's motorcade, saying an officer at the scene only informed him that those six vehicles would be moved.
Gemayel said he was also asked to take DNA samples from whom he was told were the father and mother of Abou Adas.
Gemayel said he took three samples from each of Abou Adas' parents, who were present at the Intelligence Branch of the ISF, and handed them to a person at the criminal investigation lab, which in turn referred them to another lab for testing.
The prosecution claims that Abou Adas made the false claim of responsibility for the attack on Hariri through a tape broadcast on al-Jazeera.
Calls were also made to Reuters over the false claim, the prosecution says.
On a different day, the ISF officer was given another mission of taking samples of a foot, which he was told was found at the crime scene.
He said he went to the Bourj squad, a police station in Beirut, where he took the samples to identify the person to whom the foot belonged.
He told the court that he handed the samples to a doctor at the American University of Science and Technology.
After a brief break, Gemayel told the Trial Chamber in the afternoon that he had received orders to hurry up to the Feb. 14 crime scene to start removing the destroyed vehicles, revealing that six cars belonging to Hariri's convoy were removed on the night after the explosion.
Gemayel told the Trial Chamber that his forensic team used a Bobcat bulldozer belonging to the Civil Defense to search for and gather human remains and car parts.
"We handed over the samples to the same doctor at the AUST university and I handed them in person to the doctor," he said.
"I received orders from a high-ranking officer to get to the crime scene as soon as possible," Gemayel added, noting that his mission was "limited to registering the numbers of cars and overseeing their transfer."
"We moved six vehicles on the night after the crime and we faced difficulties in moving them, that's why we used a bulldozer," he said.
During his cross-examination by the Defense, Gemayel said: "After I was tasked with the mission, a brigadier general called me and he insisted that I hurry up in my mission without telling me why."
Presiding Judge David Re asked the witness whether anyone else other than the aforementioned brigadier general had informed him of the reason behind the swift removal of the vehicles from the blast scene. The witness replied that no one else had discussed the issue with him.
Four suspects - Mustafa Badreddine, Salim Ayyash, Assad Sabra and Hassan Oneissi - are being tried in absentia for plotting what the prosecution says was a suicide truck bombing on Beirut's seafront.
A fifth Hizbullah member, Hassan Habib Merhi, was indicted later than the other four suspects and is not currently on trial.
There was also an emotional testimony by Khalil al-Arab, the son-in-law of Yahya Mustafa al-Arab, who was Hariri's head of private security.
“When the bombing went off, we panicked and started asking what happened … so I went to the AUBMC where my brother told me 'everyone’s dead,'” the witness said via video link from Beirut.
The prosecution said Yahya al-Arab was in the car behind the vehicle of Hariri when the convoy was targeted.
“After Yahya's death, Hariri's family supported al-Arab family both morally and financially,” the witness said.
Yahya al-Arab's loyalty was to Hariri, he was devoted to his work because he loved his boss, he said, chocking back tears.
The witness said he was not aware whether Yahya al-Arab would retire on Feb. 14, 2005, when he was asked a question on the issue.
He affirmed that a year later he was present when the remains of his father-in-law were taken out of the grave to make DNA tests to confirm whether all body parts belonged to him.
“His body was torn into pieces. We only buried body parts,” he said.
The witness told the court that not all family members were informed that al-Arab's body would be exhumed.
A judge asked the witness whether al-Arab used to inform his family about specific threats against Hariri.
Khalil said that Yahya used to say the situation is difficult so that his family does not get worried.
“He did not give us details,” he said.
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