Umar Abdulmutallab makes first court appearance; NBC terrorism analyst Roger Cressey discusses case

AMY ROBACH, co-host:

And we turn now to the attempted bombing of that US jetliner on Christmas Day. The suspect in the case made his first court appearance Friday in Detroit to formally face the charges against him. NBC's justice correspondent Pete Williams was there.

PETE WILLIAMS reporting:

US marshals escorted Umar Abdulmutallab in and out of the Detroit federal courthouse, surrounded by extra security, from a federal prison 45 miles away. He walked into the courtroom despite having what federal officials say are severe burns on his legs, caused when the explosive device caught fire in his lap on the plane. He told the judge he's taking pain pills, but his lawyer, a public defender, said he was clear-headed enough to follow the proceedings. In a barely audible voice, Abdulmutallab said he understood the charges and the maximum penalty. His lawyer entered a plea of not guilty for him.

Outside, several dozen members of Detroit's Muslim American community voiced their support for the prosecutors.

Ms. ZEINAB MOUGHNIA (Muslim American Demonstrator): I feel like it's so important for us Muslim Americans to send out the message that we do not condone terrorism, we do not support terrorism in any way, and terrorism is not a part of our religion whatsoever no matter what you may hear, no matter what terrorists may say.

WILLIAMS: But some former Justice Department officials say he shouldn't even be here, that he should have been declared an enemy combatant so that he could be questioned at length without a lawyer.

Mr. DAVID RIVKIN (Former Justice Department Official): It's fundamentally misleading to tell the American people that there's no compromise on our ability to get intelligence. Let's acknowledge that we're going to get intelligence not as expeditiously, not as fulsomely, by classifying him as a criminal suspect.

WILLIAMS: But an FBI official says Abdulmutallab, quote, "talked his head off." Administration officials say he stopped answering questions after about 30 hours of questioning, but before he asked for a lawyer. The deputy national security adviser told "Dateline NBC" that Abdulmutallab began talking the moment he was arrested.

Mr. DENIS McDONOUGH (Obama Advisor): That opportunity to press him very aggressively provided us very useful intelligence right out of the box.

WILLIAMS: Abdulmutallab's father was not here at the courthouse. He's the Nigerian banker who told the US in November he feared his son was becoming radicalized. But two lawyers said they were here, hired by the family to observe the proceedings. For TODAY, Pete Williams, NBC News, Detroit.

ROBACH: And for more on this case we're joined by NBC terrorism analyst Roger Cressey.

Roger, good morning.

Mr. ROGER CRESSEY (NBC Terrorism Analyst): Good morning, Amy.

ROBACH: And as we just heard in Pete's piece, it sounds like Abdulmutallab did give investigators some information, quite a bit of information, but can we trust that intelligence?

Mr. CRESSEY: Well, you can never trust what a suspect says standing alone. It has to be corroborated against other information. But Abdulmutallab told investigators that he was working through Yemen. That turned out to be right. And so he gave other information that the intelligence community was able to use. The issue is, with any type of interrogation, are you getting actionable, accurate information, and then how can you act upon it?

One point on the issue of treating him as a enemy combatant. There's no guarantee if you treat him as an enemy combatant you're going to get any further or any more accurate actionable intelligence than you would have the way he talked when he was first arrested.

ROBACH: The president's counterterrorism adviser said the government may offer Abdulmutallab some sort of plea deal. But given his role, perhaps, within al-Qaeda, his training in Yemen--he was willing to die--how likely or how willing would he be then to strike a plea deal with the government?

Mr. CRESSEY: It's tough to get in the head of a 23-year-old Nigerian who's about to face the rest of his life behind bars, but the argument here for a plea deal is, `You, Abdulmutallab, need to tell us more about how al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula is operating right now, what their plans are, what other members of their network are out there,' so the US counterterrorism group can do a better job identifying and preventing future plots. If he doesn't have that information, then he's not going to get a plea deal and he's going away for the rest of his life.

ROBACH: It's interesting, Roger, this week we heard the president say and talk about the challenges of a lone recruit, someone like Abdulmutallab. That said, what exactly are the unique challenges of a suspect like this 23-year-old?

Mr. CRESSEY: Well, he was radicalized before he got to Yemen. Clearly his time in London played a role in that. And what the intelligence community, both ours as well as our allies', have to do is figure out how to identify these type of people earlier in the process before they operationalize. It's a tremendous challenge because someone can harbor anti-American views, but that doesn't mean they're going to become a terrorist. Someone can go to Yemen to study Sharia law; that doesn't men they're going to work with AQAP. So separating that wheat and chaff and identifying the key pieces of data that points to a person being a potential concern, that's the real challenge, and it's very tough.

ROBACH: Right, and the president outlined some steps. He felt like the government needed to take better steps to connect the dots, to identify someone like Abdulmutallab. What do you make of the president's proposals in terms of trying to prevent future cases?

Mr. CRESSEY: Well, one thing, Amy, it's remarkable two weeks after the attempted attack there's now a report out where the administration is very honest with the American people about what went wrong. And it's important to remember this wasn't a failure of information sharing. The information was in the system. It was a failure to look for the proper information. So there's two things have to happen. First, we got to do a better job identifying resources to ensure we're looking strategically. Al-Qaeda in Yemen was always a threat. The United States understood it. They never thought that they could attack the United--the US homeland. Second issue is you got to use better technology. You can't rely just on human analysts to process this enormous volume of counterterrorism data. So it's human policy, but it's also technology to combine together to give us a better chance to prevent the next attack.

ROBACH: All right, Roger Cressey. Thanks so much.

Mr. CRESSEY: You bet, Amy.

ROBACH: And now here's Lester.

LESTER HOLT, co-host:

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